by Lori Lapekes
The Gingerbread Boy
by Lori Lapekes
Published by Astraea Press
www.astreaeapress.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used. Except for review purposes, the reproduction of this book in whole or part, electronically or mechanically, constitutes a copyright violation.
THE GINGERBREAD BOY
Copyright © 2013 LORI LAPEKES
ISBN 978-1-62135-164-1
Cover Art Designed by For the Muse Designs
I dedicate this book in the memory of one of the kindest souls I’ve ever known, Mr. Paul Ferner (Esquire)
PART ONE
Chapter One
Catherine doubted the stale cheese curl could adequately punch a creepy stranger in the eye. But what felt like a dime, a crumpled ticket for a campus meal, and that stale, pointed cheese curl were all she could scrape out of her coat pocket. And unfortunately, the footsteps down the otherwise deserted sidewalk behind her were getting nerve-wrackingly closer.
She glanced back at the stranger behind her as branches swung above her like bony fingers in the wind. Snowflakes spiraled before the tall form in a long dark coat. She noticed a splash of red near the head. A scarf? A hat? Catherine couldn’t be sure. As her deep brown hair billowed past her face, she turned her head forward, and forced her legs to move faster. Stiffening her shoulders in what she hoped appeared a confident manner she lifted her chin, praying she was wrong about this man following her. It couldn’t be her old boyfriend, Calvin, stalking her. Please, not that monster.
Breathe slowly. Feel the air rushing in and out of your lungs. Be realistic. Calvin is hundreds of miles away. Yet she winced as the memory of the breakup with that cruel man rushed back to her, and angrily pushed those thoughts aside. What a revolting thing to have running around in her head.
Swish… crunch. The footsteps were growing closer. Matching her own.
How had she ended up this far from campus anyway? She loved the MSU campus with its sprawling, timeless beauty. She could have taken a long walk anywhere there, but she’d had to do something different. Walk in a surrounding neighborhood. Why hadn’t she looked back a few times in her wanderings over these unfamiliar sidewalks on this get-out-of-town stroll past all these dark-windowed houses? The noise, shouting and general mayhem surrounding the Michigan State win still hurt her head; it seemed every house near or around East Lansing’s M.A.C. Avenue was partying. The throng of voices shouting “State! State! State!” still throbbed in her ears. But no one seemed to be celebrating in that area of town, as she’d originally hoped. There was no one around at all. No one except one strange man following her, that was.
“I should confront the stalker, I’ve done it before,” Catherine muttered, balling her hands into fists. She stared down at the snow-powdered sidewalk sliding beneath her feet. Then, looking up, hope stirred in her. The sidewalk took a bend around a massive shrub that might temporarily shield her from the stranger’s view. Could she simply hide from him? It seemed a much more appealing alternative than confronting him with nothing except a stale cheese curl.
Catherine scurried around the shrub, and then spotted an even better shelter, a thick-trunked maple tree near the road. Noticing that the sidewalk wound around another corner not far ahead, she hurried to the far side of the tree, pressed back against the rough bark, and held her breath. Her skin tingled. Maybe the stranger would walk on, out of sight, not realizing he’d passed her. She stared at the road only a few feet in front of her. No tire tracks broke the powdery snow. Didn’t anybody ever drive down this street? Her heart lurched as a thought struck her. Had she left footprints? There was half an inch of snow on the ground! With a gasp she pressed tighter against the tree, feeling the bark jabbing into her back, too afraid to peer around the trunk.
Silence. Catherine held her breath. She listened for the sound of his boots, but could hear nothing beyond the relentless throbbing of her heartbeat in her ears. Moments passed. Summoning frozen muscles to move, she edged farther around the tree, careful not to trip on the slippery roots poking above the snow. Snowflakes spun in the streetlight as she contemplated her predicament. Maybe the stranger had passed already. Flattened against the enormous tree trunk, she wasn’t able to tell where he went. How many minutes had gone by? It seemed it’d been enough time to let the man walk past, especially if he’d merely been an innocent local on some errand, which he probably was. Of course he was! Silly her. What a dummy.
Catherine closed her eyes, her heart slowing in relief. She removed her stiffened hands from the icy bark behind her and cradled her fingers for warmth. What a fool she’d been. So afraid, and of what? Probably of nothing. When her heart stopped racing she slowly opened her eyes…
…to see the man standing directly in front of her.
Catherine’s leg sprung out like a lever and she kicked him in the kneecap. He backed in surprise, slipped, and then fell. Catherine turned to run, but in her haste, tripped on the tree roots. Her arms pin-wheeled in the air, and she slammed to the ground a few feet from him. She prepared to scamper back on all fours, to kick, to bite, anything in defense until she looked into the man’s face.
This wasn’t Calvin coming back to torment her, just a heavily bundled man, rubbing his kneecap, and staring at her with dark, almond-shaped eyes. A cap was pulled down over much of his forehead, and a red scarf obscured his face from the nose down. The man reached up with one hand and loosened his scarf enough to speak.
“Does this mean we’ve fallen for each other?”
Catherine’s fear ebbed, but only slightly. “Why did you sneak up on me like that?” she blustered. “I could have done a lot more damage. I could have…”
“I was too close to you for a kick that high.”
“My knee would have done the job!”
The man shrugged, and then released his own knee to sit back and look at her. From the crinkling around his eyes, Catherine sensed he was smiling behind the scarf.
“You think this is funny?” she gasped, her mind still spinning with thoughts of escape. “Why were you following me like that!”
His voice was gentle. “I was afraid you’d think I was following you. But I wasn’t.”
Catherine let that statement fall flat. “So why did you sneak up in front of me just now? Where did you come from?”
“The man raised his eyes and pointed a finger toward the sky. “From a distant galaxy, far, far away.”
Catherine smirked and scooted back in the snow, feeling dampness seeping through her backside. “This is embarrassing,” she mumbled, creeping backward, waiting for a chance to lurch to her feet and run.
The man shrugged. “Don’t worry. No one saw us.” He paused, then, “You know, I was in a bowling alley one day, and saw a pair of pantyhose fall out of a woman’s slacks and land in the middle of the alley. Probably caught in the dryer from static cling. Now that had to be embarrassing.”
Catherine raised her eyebrows at the nonchalant manner in which the man had just stated such a peculiar thing. Her lips begged to tug upward at the picture forming in her mind, but she forced her countenance to remain grim. “Don’t you get embarrassed?” she asked, still inching backward, backward…
Again, he shrugged, seeming to be thinking. “When I was younger, a store owner caught me as I twisted the lid off of a peanut butter jar to drop a rubber spider inside. I was a little embarrassed that day. And a lot so
re when my mother got after me.”
She couldn’t stop it. Catherine’s mouth tipped in a slight grin, but she refused to humor him with any more questions. She peered at him, trying to guess this jokester’s age, but it was hard to tell in the dark with so much of his face obscured. She wondered if he was also an MSU student, and what he was doing walking around this far from East Lansing, like she was.
He’s a smooth-talking serial killer, came her brother Tony’s voice in her mind all of a sudden. He wants to get to know his victims before he attacks. Because Tony’s voice jarred into in her mind so often, Catherine wondered if she had any consciousness left of her own. She shook her head as if to scatter the thoughts.
“What does your sweatshirt say?” the man suddenly asked, and Catherine found him gazing at her chest. Her cheeks started to burn until she realized that the buttons on her coat had popped loose when she fell, revealing the words. The stranger read the sentence out loud. “Real doctors treat more than one species.” He paused, and settled back a little lower in the snow. “What year veterinary medicine are you in?”
“First year.”
“Undergrad?”
“No. This is the grueling real thing.”
They stared at each other a few more moments as Catherine’s backside began to prickle from the cold. “Are you a student?” she asked, shifting her weight, surprised that she was no longer eager to run. If this man was a lunatic, he was an interesting one.
He shook his head. “No, I live in the area.” He pulled his knees up and clasped his hands around them, and Catherine was surprised at his graceful, long fingers. Hands much too graceful to strangle or harm someone…she hoped.
Suddenly he was holding a hand out to her.
“I’m Daniel,” he said.
She stared at his hand, and stiffened. Although it appeared Daniel wasn’t dangerous, she realized many women, including herself, had been charmed by monsters in disguise and were later attacked or worse.
“I’m Catherine. Catherine with a ‘C,’” she finally replied.
“Greetings, Catherine with a ‘C,” Daniel said. “Are you called Catherine or Cathy?”
“Catherine is fine, although friends sometimes call me Cathy.” She paused a moment, wondering what to say, then, “Do you prefer to be called Dan, or Danny?”
“I like Daniel. My full name. Sounds respectable.”
“I see. Respectable.” They quickly shook hands. And were quiet once again.
Finally Daniel cocked an eyebrow at her. “Is your butt as numb as mine is?”
Catherine raised her eyebrows. “It must be. I’d forgotten I had one.”
Daniel offered his hand again. As she took it, he rose to his feet and pulled her up with him. She fought the notion to turn and run as he released her hand and began to brush the snow off of his clothes. Where was there to run to?
“Are you all right?” he asked, “That was a pretty hard fall.”
“I’m fine. You seem to be okay, too, considering the kick, and the cold.”
“Speaking of cold, it’s getting worse by the minute,” said Daniel. “It seems too early in the season for this. Maybe you should button your coat back up.”
Catherine buttoned it with cold, unresponsive fingers. She felt awkward, like a toddler trying to clasp her jacket for the first time.
“Don’t feel bad,” Daniel said, slipping his own hands deep inside his coat pockets, “I have that problem every day.”
There was a thoughtful silence, and Catherine wondered what he meant by that, but continued with her task. When she had buttoned her coat at last, Daniel sighed and turned to leave. “Time to carry on,” he said. “I really wasn’t following you deliberately,” he added, turning his head back toward her as he began to walk away. “Be careful out there.”
“So long,” Catherine called after him, watching him shrink into a blur in the darkness behind gently falling snow. Her eyebrows knitted together. Something seemed wrong. A sinking sensation filled her chest. Almost a longing. But how could that be? He was only a man, a “filthy abomination,” according to her ancient friend, Hazel VanHoofstryver. Yet she and Daniel had had a conversation. They knew each other’s names. There was a lingering feeling of unfinished business.
She was tempted to call out to him but what in the world would she yell? She should just forget about him, and go on with her stroll as she’d planned all along. Forget about the stranger from a distant galaxy.
Catherine was almost ready to walk in the opposite direction when she saw Daniel’s snow-shrouded figure pitch forward and crumple on the sidewalk. She gasped and hurried toward him. In seconds she was standing above his motionless form. She reached down to shake him. “Daniel! Are you all right?”
He spoke from beneath the crook of his arm. “My knee,” he moaned. “It gave out on me. I think your kick did more damage than I realized.”
Catherine’s mind spun. How hard had she kicked him? She glanced down at her pointed, leather boots darkened from the snow. Weapons, those things!
Daniel worked himself into a sitting position, clutching the injured leg. His face twisted in a grimace.
“I’m sorry I kicked you,” she sputtered, “but you snuck up on me! What was I supposed to do?” She squatted down next to him. “Here, let me examine it, maybe I can tell what’s wrong…”
“No, no, stay away,” Daniel interrupted, lifting his hand in defense.
“Well, at least let me help you up, and find some way to get you to a med center.” Catherine pulled his arm around her neck and awkwardly helped him to his feet.
“There, that’s good. Let’s call for help…” But Daniel was obviously not listening. He turned away and seemed distracted, almost in odd disinterest.
“I’m just trying to help.” Catherine said. “If you don’t want it, fine. I just hope you don’t have to crawl home.” She took his arm off her shoulder, half expecting him to tumble back down. When he didn’t, she stuffed her hands into her coat pockets and began to stalk away.
“I suppose I’ll be on my way, too!” Daniel called. Then Catherine heard him whistling casually behind her. She turned in astonishment to see him strolling down the sidewalk as though he hadn’t a care in the world.
“You phony!” she called.
He glanced behind, flashed a peace sign, then turned and continued to whistle. He only walked a few more steps before something exploded across his back. He turned in surprise, only to duck another snowball sailing toward his head.
“It’s the attack of the vicious veterinarian!” he called, walking backward. A second later he turned to run as Catherine bore down on him with a snowball as large as a grapefruit.
Catherine chased him a block before hurling the white mass at his back. She slowed in smug accomplishment as she watched it explode across his coat.
Daniel raised his arms into the air as he turned around. “I give up! Uncle!”
Catherine smiled, remembering how Tony used to pin her to the ground and rub sweaty socks in her face until she said “uncle.” Then Daniel flashed her the peace sign again and she laughed, suddenly wanting to whip the stupid hat and scarf off to see what the grown-up version of a little boy who slipped rubber spiders into peanut butter jars really looked like.
“What’s up with you, anyway?” she asked, still puffing from the chase. “Acting like some mischievous leftover from the sixties.”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I do feel mischievous. I don’t get many Friday nights to myself.”
“Oh really?”
“Really. So why are you walking around alone like this on Friday night? Why aren’t you…” He paused, as if trying to decide what to add. “…why aren’t you out enjoying the partying after the big game?”
“What makes you think I don’t have plans to party?””
He shrugged. “You don’t seem the type.”
“What type?”
“The wild type. Loud music, drinking, fast crowds, you know.”
>
Catherine crossed her arms and sighed. “Actually, you’re right. I’m not like that. I’d rather surround myself with people of substance.”
“Those folks generally are full of substance.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I do. I’m glad to know my first impression of you was correct.” Daniel said as Catherine looked away and ground her heel into the sidewalk. “What is your impression of me now?” he continued, “Do I still frighten you?”
Catherine studied him. A dusting of snow covered his hat and shoulders, and in the streetlight she could see it sparkling on his eyelashes. He was quite tall, and appeared to have a slender build beneath the bulky coat. By the soft tone of his voice, he was no barroom brawler. She shivered, but not from fear or cold.
No, whether it was stupid or not, she was surprised to find he no longer frightened her.
“I’m not afraid of you,” she said. “If I was, I wouldn’t still be here.” She thought of his other question. “I see you as the kind of guy who likes to think he’s still a kid.”
Daniel nodded. “I take that as a compliment.”
Catherine made a confused face.
“It’s healthy to be childlike, sometimes,” he continued, loosening the scarf and lifting his face toward the sky. Suddenly he flicked out his tongue, and Catherine’s eyes widened as she watched him catch a snowflake on it. He smiled in a smug fashion. “You can’t be serious all of the time,” he added.
“Do you think I’m too serious?” Catherine asked, folding her arms.
“I hope not,” he said, “But I don’t know you well enough.”
“Well, those wet splatter marks on your back should prove I’m not always overly serious.”
He contemplated her remark. “True,” he finally said. “I guess you’re all right for ‘a not-always-overly-serious’ young woman walking alone in an unfamiliar neighborhood in the dark.”
“You’re alone too.” She reminded him.
“My van broke down a few blocks back,” Daniel finally explained, “I’m heading to a friend’s place for help. He lives nearby. I suppose I was following you deliberately, in a way, because I could have taken a short cut to get to Joey’s, but I wasn’t comfortable with the idea of a woman walking alone around here. This section of town can get rowdy.” He paused, acknowledging Catherine’s puzzled eyes. “It seems quiet now, but in a little while, it’ll get obnoxious.”
