Single White Female

by John Lutz

  Allie was under arrest for murder. This was how it felt.

  But what was she feeling? She couldn’t be sure. Was this actually happening? Was it?

  She heard the shrill Whooop! Whooop! Whooop! of a siren in the distance, forging through congested traffic. It sounded like an exhilarated beast closing in for the kill. She was having difficulty breathing. Standing. Her legs began an uncontrollable trembling and she feared she might wet herself.

  “Just relax now,” Kennedy told her soothingly, smiling. “I’m going to read you your rights, dear.”

  33

  Lawrence gathered up the breakfast dishes while Hedra read the Times. She was absently chewing on a piece of toast with strawberry jam on it, smiling.

  So the police had arrested Allie. Charged her with murder. The story was no longer front-page news in the Times, but Hedra had been following the case in the papers and on TV and was waiting and watching for this inevitable development. She was sure the coverage in the Post would be more detailed, and probably on the front page, complete with photographs and a rehash of the murder. After breakfast, she’d go out and buy several papers and learn all she could. She used a forefinger to wipe jam from a corner of her mouth and licked the finger.

  There was a clanking roar behind her: Lawrence running the garbage disposal. The roar became a growl and then ceased abruptly.

  Lawrence said, “Shit! Fucker’s stopped up again.”

  Hedra swiveled in her chair and watched while he probed the disposal with a wood-handled ice pick. Stabbing at whatever was caught there as if he were chipping ice. Something in the disposal smelled like rotten eggs; she wished he’d get the thing unclogged as soon as possible. Phew! It was getting stronger.

  Lawrence was a twentyish black man with the face of an aesthete and the body of a twelve-year-old boy. He was wearing only his white Jockey shorts, and he looked ridiculous standing there playing plumber.

  He bent to reach beneath the sink, punched the red reset button, and the disposal rattled and roared again. He turned on the tap water to wash the mechanism free and beamed at Hedra as if he’d accomplished something important.

  She said, “Well, aren’t you some pumpkin?”

  He looked unsure about how to take her remark. Instead of answering, he busied himself again with the breakfast dishes, rinsing and scraping them before propping them in the dishwasher. Now and then the knife he was scraping with screeched against the surface of a plate, like a creature in pain.

  After a few minutes he glanced over his shoulder and said, “You sure we got enough stash laid in?”

  Focusing her attention again on the paper, Hedra said, “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Gotta worry. Stuff’s gettin’ impossible to steal at the hospital. Locks, record sheets, sign in, sign out. You wouldn’t believe the shit they make everybody go through so nobody can walk out with a thing. I mean not even a fuckin’ tongue depressor leaves that place.”

  “You don’t need it from there anymore,” Hedra reminded him. “Don’t need a bit of it from there.”

  “Good fuckin’ thing,” Lawrence said, clinking knives and forks into the dishwasher’s flatware basket.

  She’d lived with Lawrence Leacock in his tiny apartment in the days since Sam’s death, seldom going out. She hadn’t even been inside a church since the incident at St. Ambrose’s. She’d waited until after mass and attended confession, not out of guilt but as a plea for understanding. She should have known better. She could still hear the gasp of the priest on the other side of the confessional screen before she’d fled. She was sure he hadn’t gotten a good look at her. She’d been careful about that, even while entering the confessional, perhaps anticipating his reaction.

  Lawrence, a kinky lab technician and coke addict she’d let pick her up in a bar up near Harlem, was only too glad to take care of her. After all, she took care of him, and almost every night. A girl had to do what a girl had to do.

  Hedra flicked a glance at Lawrence and then continued to read. The Times speculated that, given the nature of the crime, it was possible Allie might plead insanity. That irritated Hedra. She knew Sam’s killer wasn’t insane. Allie’d had to kill him, as well as that obnoxious snooping playwright. Sometimes Fate took control, grabbed people by the short hairs and dragged them, leaving no real choice of direction or destination.

  “You want another cup of coffee, Allison?” Lawrence asked.

  Hedra shook her head no, not looking at him. You could take only so much of a kitehead like Lawrence. She continued staring at the paper, now only pretending to read it. Thinking.

  No, she wasn’t insane. Not anymore. If she’d ever been. They’d never really made up their minds about her anyway. Their own minds that circled like pale vultures so high above hers, so far above suspicion. One of the white-coated fools had even suggested she might be a multiple personality. As if everyone didn’t have more than one side. Hedra had overheard them talking about her overwhelming and formative need to escape reality, as if that, too, were unique. Tell me about it, she thought. Explain how I’m different from the millions of people who use drugs and alcohol regularly to escape from this shitty world for a while. Explain why I shouldn’t want to forget the past, after what my father did to create that kind of past. Night after night in my bed, putting his hands on me again and again. Dream after dream that was real. “She wants desperately to be someone else,” they’d whispered, trying to keep it a secret, but she’d heard it through the walls. “Poor child never really developed a center,” her mother, poor mother, had said, quoting another white coat. “Doesn’t have a sense of self-worth or identity. Wants to be someone else, anyone but who she is. My fault, my fault. Wants to be someone else.”

  Not anymore, Hedra thought, spreading strawberry jam on her third piece of toast.

  Now I know who I am.

  Lawrence had picked up the long-bladed knife he’d used to slice bacon and was placing it in the dishwasher. Hedra thought about asking him to bring it to her, then she changed her mind. She couldn’t imagine why the thought had occurred to her.

  34

  Hedra had watched and waited, and when the time was right she met a Haller-Davis rental agent at the Cody Arms, a woman named Myra Klinger who was blocky as a soccer player and wore a pinstriped blue business suit complete with a yellow power tie and cuffed pants. Unexpectedly, Myra had a martyred nun’s face with brown, injured eyes.

  As she unlocked the door to apartment 3H, she looked oddly at Hedra. Hedra had dyed her hair red and styled it in a graceful backsweep, and with her altered makeup and deliberately added weight she had no fear of being recognized by any of the tenants. And even if she were recognized, it would merely be as someone they’d seen before in the building; they wouldn’t connect her with Allie, whose own presence they’d only vaguely acknowledged. New York anonymity was a curse for some, for others a proper blessing.

  Myra said, “Strange, you being named Jones. The woman who lived here last was named Jones.”

  Hedra smiled. “Common name. That’s why my parents named me Eilla. Eilla Jones.”

  Myra swept open the door and stepped aside so Hedra could enter. It was all one smooth and expectant motion, like someone introducing a celebrity to an audience.

  The apartment looked shockingly bare, and the traffic noises from outside seemed louder and more echoing than Hedra remembered. The scatter rugs were of course gone; there wasn’t the slightest clutter in the place, and that changed its character entirely. But it could be furnished almost exactly the way it had been the day Hedra moved in. Standing and staring, Hedra could see it, all the furniture in place, the television playing and a book lying on the sofa, and there was a cup of hot chocolate resting on the fat sofa arm.

  Home, she thought. I live here. I’m who I am, so there’s nowhere else I should be, nowhere else I could be.

  The air stirred by the opening door had settled back down; the atmosphere in the apartment was hot and close, thick enough for H
edra to feel lying smooth and heavy as the softest velvet on her bare skin.

  She knew she was expected to react to the apartment, to say something, so she said, “Spacious, but it could be cozy, too.” She walked down the hall, glanced into the bathroom as if looking at it for the first time. She nodded with approval. Nice touch, that. She peeked into the bedrooms and smiled.

  “The place’ll be painted,” Myra assured her.

  Hedra faced Myra Klinger and said, “No, I love it exactly the way it is. I wouldn’t change a thing.”

  “You sure? It can be painted the same colors.”

  “I’m sure. And I can pay you three months’ rent in advance. I’m promised a good job here, have been for months and now it’s been confirmed, so money’s no problem.” Hedra told her about a job as a computer programmer. She gave Lawrence’s phone number as the company number, in case Haller-Davis decided to check. She didn’t think they’d bother, with a three-month advance plus a security desposit. And it was such a convincing story; she was so good at manipulating people like Myra Klinger, at sizing them up and then using them. It was, after all, their hearts’ desire.

  Myra was thinking hard about the situation.

  “To tell you the truth,” Hedra said, “this is the last apartment on the list a rental service company gave me. If I don’t get this one, I’m not sure what’ll happen; I don’t have any more apartments to look at.”

  “You could get a new list.”

  “The way property is in Manhattan, I doubt if that’d help.”

  Myra shook her broad head and frowned. “Yeah, it’s a hell of a world sometimes. Hell of a city, anyway.”

  “Sure is.”

  “People get trapped in all kinds of ways.”

  “Don’t they, though?”

  “Even caring, affectionate people whose only real crime is being human.”

  “Or different,” Hedra said.

  “That, too.”

  Hedra locked gazes with Myra until she felt the subtle arc of current she’d expected. “Different people in particular get fucked over in this city, so they’ve gotta stick together, don’t you think?”

  Myra’s breasts were rising and falling. “Are you positive you want this apartment, Eilla?”

  “I especially want it,” Hedra said. “And I’ll do anything to get it.”

  Myra smiled. “Maybe there won’t be any problem. I might recommend you get the apartment.”

  “Oh, God! Thanks, Mrs. Klinger!”

  Myra looked as if her feelings had been stepped on. She said, “It’s Ms. And remember I said ‘might.’ ”

  “Oh, sure. Sorry. There’s one thing more, Ms. Klinger.”

  “It can be Myra.”

  Hedra grinned. She just bet it could be “Myra.” “Fine. What I mean is, is there a storage area in the basement?”

  “Why, yes, there is.”

  “Would it be okay if I took a look at it? I’ve got some stuff to store—boxes of books and a bicycle.”

  “I don’t see why you can’t have a look,” Myra said.

  Hedra rode to the basement with Myra in the service elevator. It was the sub-basement, actually, as the basement itself had long ago been converted to apartments.

  In the time she’d lived at the Cody Arms, Hedra had been to the basement only once. She remembered being surprised by its dim vastness, as she was again now. Though it was warm beneath the octopus tangle of heating ducts and with the boilers nearby, there was a cold feel to the basement, as if it were a cave. And in a way, Hedra thought, it was a man-made cave. Far below street level.

  The south end of the basement was partitioned into what might be described as stalls. Square, equal areas divided by thick slat fencing that ran from floor to ceiling. There were spaces of about two inches between the slats. Each stall had a section of slats that swung open to provide access. These were the “storage lockers” of the apartments above. The ones that had items stored inside—about a third of them—were equipped with heavy padlocks. There was a number stenciled on each locker, corresponding with an apartment number.

  Myra knew her way around down here. She reached up with a stocky arm and yanked a pull cord, and a low-wattage bare bulb winked on and lessened the dimness in a limited area. She gripped Hedra’s elbow tenderly and led the way down the corridor between rows of storage lockers, reaching up two more times to work a pull cord and shed light as they walked. From somewhere in the basement came a steady electrical buzzing, perhaps a transformer. The sound faded behind them.

  Allie’s locker was about halfway down the row. It was empty. Hedra was disappointed. She’d thought maybe some of Allie’s things might still be down here, overlooked when Allie’s possessions had been moved out. Directly across from Allie’s storage space was the locker for 4H, Graham Knox’s apartment. Hedra saw that it still contained what was left of Graham’s possessions. In the shadows she could make out a dented file cabinet, and on top of it an old typewriter gathering dust. Probably the junk was tied up in probate court, Hedra thought, or maybe simply waiting to be hauled away.

  “Damn,” Myra said, fumbling with a large ring of keys. “I don’t think I have anything that fits this lock, or I could open the door and you could get a better idea of how much space there is.”

  “Well, that’s okay,” Hedra said. She ran a hand across the slats. “I can estimate pretty well from here. What I got’ll fit right in there.”

  “I’ll get the key to you later, I promise.”

  “You don’t strike me as the type that’d break a promise,” Hedra said. A large roach ventured into the light, then turned and scurried along the base of a storage locker and back into darkness. “Or go back on a bargain.”

  “I’m not,” Myra said in a strained voice. She rested a hand on Hedra’s shoulder, near the base of her neck. “Are you?”

  “No,” Hedra said, smiling into the brown, agonized eyes. Not unlike Lawrence’s eyes, only older. More resigned.

  The two women left the dim basement and went back upstairs to the apartment.

  35

  Hedra hadn’t said good-bye to Lawrence. Well, he hadn’t known they were parting, so what did it matter? She’d given him some coke that was like none he’d ever snorted or smoked. The ultimate and final high. He lay curled in a corner of the bathroom while she’d methodically removed every trace of herself from his life.

  Before leaving she’d looked in on him, and he hadn’t moved. He’d probably never move again under his own power. “Lucky Lawrence,” she’d said softly before walking out. “You got what you wanted.”

  Hedra moved into the Cody Arms and began buying furniture. She’d taken the largest bedroom; it had a better view and more closet space.

  Her first night back in the apartment she’d sat on the bare floor where the sofa used to be, sipping hot chocolate, watching a mixture of sleet and rain smear the dark window and cause her reflection to waver. She was wearing her dark slacks and favorite yellow blouse, her brown sandals that were slightly too large for her but comfortable. She studied her other self in the flat and undulating window pane and she and her Other exchanged smiles.

  Sitting in the dim warmth of the apartment, listening to the splatter of rain dripping from the gutters onto the gargoyle stonework, she felt a contentment she hadn’t known since rare moments as a child. She was in a secret place, a place to hide, and in a way she could carry it with her wherever she went and it gave her an unshakable peace and confidence. It was her most precious possession.

  The next morning she took a cab to a beauty salon on lower Broadway and had her hair dyed blond and trimmed in the old Allie fashion. It was also the first day of her diet.

  No one in the Cody Arms seemed to pay much attention to her. If the pleasantly plump woman who’d just moved in on the third floor looked remotely familiar, it wasn’t mentioned. At least not to Hedra’s knowledge. And if it was noticed, the fact that she was rumored to be the previous tenant’s sister accounted for any resemblance of c
lothing or gesture. Hedra and the other tenants played the New York game of studiously avoiding eye contact and stayed out of each other’s lives. Random collisions of fate could cause problems.

  When Hedra went out at night, she seldom drifted in the direction of the Village. In a city the size of New York there were countless places to go, countless men cruising for companionship. Looking for someone like Hedra.

  Always she introduced herself as Allie Jones. The name had long ago faded from the news and caused no flicker of recognition and required no explanation. Allie Jones, one of the many on the make and available to be made.

  At Apple of My Eye, a lounge on East 21st Street, she was picked up by a handsome young stockbroker. The Manhattan single girl’s dream. He’d peered at her through the haze of tobacco smoke and the flashing, multicolored strobe lights and, talking loud to be heard above the music, said his name was Andy. She told him she was Allison but he should call her Allie. First names only. That was the protocol for places like this. They’d stay on a first-name basis while they explored each other and decided how far the relationship might travel.

  Andy was tall and angular, with sharp and sensitive features and thick black hair that was parted with geometric precision and seemed never to get mussed. He dressed well, though a little too trendy; shoulders a shade too padded, pleated pants too tight at the cuffs. Narrow black shoes with built-up heels, made more for dancing than walking, added half an inch to his height, though he didn’t need it. He must have bought the shoes for style. Or maybe he was some kind of dance buff. There were plenty of them around. Young Fred Astaires.

  That first night at Apple he’d asked Hedra to dance, then guided her through a complex series of steps she didn’t know. But she had no difficulty following his strong lead. She knew he was making them both look good. Fred and Ginger. The man could damn well move.

  “You dance great,” he’d told her.