Countdown to Killing Kurtis

by Lauren Rowe

  It’s clear Wesley’s not listening to a word I say.

  “Wesley?”

  He lurches forward and wraps his body around mine. “Buttercup,” he mumbles, nuzzling into my hair. He inhales deeply, squeezing me tight.

  “Oh, Wesley,” I say, hugging him back with all my might. “Time’s gonna fly by, honey. You’ll see.”

  “I’m gonna miss you,” he replies, his voice breaking.

  “Aw, come on now, Wesley. There’s no time for this. We’ve gotta come up with our plan.”

  But Wesley doesn’t pay me any mind, and thank goodness for that. All of a sudden, he’s laying soft kisses all over my face—on my lips, cheeks, eyes, nose, and ears—until my head is spinning and my heart is squeezing. “I’m gonna be counting the minutes,” he breathes.

  “Aw, come on now, Wesley,” I choke out. “Time’s gonna fly.”

  Wesley’s kissing my cheek, pressing himself against me, stroking my hair, and there’s nothing I want more than to throw my arms around him and never let go. But I can’t. “Wesley,” I say, my knees wobbling. “Come on, honey. We’ve got to figure this out.” Honestly, I could stay here forever with Wesley, just like this. But I’ve got a sacred destiny to fulfill, and that’s more important than anything else.

  Wesley pulls back, nodding.

  I touch his cheek. “Okay?”

  He nods.

  “Let’s figure this out.”

  Wesley wipes his eyes and nods.

  “All right, then. Mrs. Clements said Mr. Clements’ most valuable card is some guy named Yogi—not Joe DiMaggio, after all.”

  Wesley’s mouth hangs open. “Not the Yankee Clipper?”

  “Nope. She said Joe’s his favorite card, but not the most valuable one. So don’t put Yogi under the tree for me with the others, okay? Keep it hidden somewhere really good so that, when the time comes, you can use it to buy your bus ticket to Hollywood.”

  “Ah, good thinking, Buttercup.”

  “Maybe under your mattress?”

  Wesley shakes his head. “I’ll figure out a good place.”

  “Somewhere good,” I say. The boy’s as sweet as can be, but lord only knows what ‘a good hiding place’ means to him.

  “Gotcha.” He shoots me a beaming smile.

  Dang it, when Wesley smiles at me like that, I feel like blurting, “Damn it all to hell—come with me!” But that dog won’t hunt, and I know it. If Wesley’s meant to join me in Hollywood one day, then that’s what will happen, exactly as it should. I’ll just have to let fate take the wheel on that. In the meantime, though, as hard as it is to leave Wesley behind to do my dirty work for me, I don’t have a choice in the matter. Before I can even think about starting a new, happy life with Wesley out in Hollywood, I’ve got get our there and get discovered in a malt shop and find my daddy and get my mansion ready (if Daddy hasn’t managed it quite yet), and just plain figure things out.

  Chapter 21

  17 Years, 11 Months, 29 Days Old

  742 Days Before Killing Kurtis

  When I arrive home from school, everyone is gone, as usual. Hallelujah. I’ll officially turn eighteen at midnight tonight, eight hours and seventeen minutes from now. Before then, though, I’ve got a few things to take care of in the house.

  I grab the rubber gloves from the kitchen sink and head up to Mr. and Mrs. Clements’ room. I work quickly. I take a handful of baseball cards out of the big box that’s sitting next to Mr. Clements’ desk. I count out twenty cards—it doesn’t matter which ones, the first twenty random cards will do. I creep into the closet, remove the quilt from the top of the safe, and open the lock. 56-21-30. I roll my eyes yet again at the simplicity of it and about how it took me so damned long to figure it out.

  When I “brainstormed” numbers with Wesley yesterday, it was a delicious kind of fun leading him right to the edge of figuring out the correct numbers, asking him all the right leading questions and throwing out all the right wonderings so that finally, ever so slowly, Wesley “thought” of the combination himself without me ever having to say the actual numbers myself.

  When Wesley comes up here tomorrow and opens the safe using the numbers he thought of “all by himself,” he’s going to think he’s as smart as a hooty owl. I smile to myself. It warms my heart to think of Wesley feeling good about himself. He deserves at least that much after all he’s been through in his life.

  I reach into the safe and remove the envelope full of cash, plus Joe, Lou, and Babe. Just for the heck of it, I take Mickey Mantle, too, because, even though I’ve never heard of him before, I’m thinking I might want to look at his handsome face a time or two during the long bus ride out to California.

  I remove the cash from the envelope and stuff the bills into my bra and then take those random twenty baseball cards from the big box, plus the Yogi Berra card, too, and slip them into the envelope that formerly held the cash. Last minute, I put twenty dollars into the envelope, too, and then I place the envelope inside the safe. Again, I smile thinking about the expression on Wesley’s face when he opens the safe tomorrow. I wish I could be here to see it—I can only imagine how precious it’s gonna be.

  I close the safe, reset the combination lock, and cover it with the quilt; then I sneak downstairs, return the rubber gloves to the kitchen cabinet, pack my little suitcase with everything I own (which now includes some spiffy baseball cards and a whole lot of cash), and sit on the couch in the main room to wait for Mrs. Clements to return home so I can say a proper goodbye. I look at the clock. Mrs. Clements should be here any minute.

  Poor Wesley. It pains me to think what might happen to him after I’m gone. I reckon when Mr. Clements notices his precious cards and money are missing, he’s gonna tear this whole damned house apart. And when he finds that Yogi Berra card in whatever stupid place Wesley stashes it—because that boy could throw himself onto the ground and miss—it’ll be off-to-juvie time for poor Wesley.

  If by some miracle Mr. Clements doesn’t find that Yogi card, which I sincerely hope turns out to be the case, I reckon Wesley might be up shit-creek without a paddle, anyway. Because when Mr. Clements starts accusing people, and someone speculates out loud, “Hey, what about Charlene?” I’m guessing Wesley’s gonna confess to being the thief. He’ll swear he did the stealing alone, too, with no help from anyone else, least of all the girl who hardly ever spoke to him for the past two years.

  Where are the damned cards? Mr. Clements will demand to know.

  I’ll never tell, Wesley will say—or, hell, maybe he’ll say, I hid ’em out by the big oak tree, for all I know, because, why not? By then, he’ll be snickering to himself that the envelope he stole from the safe is long gone, just like we planned. Of course, I’m not really gonna hang around here just to retrieve those twenty worthless cards and twenty bucks, but I reckon they’ll be gone just the same. Because surely, some rag-tag kid at the bus station will be more than happy to treat himself to a short stack of baseball cards and an Andrew Jackson hidden under a rock, especially if a sweet-as-pie girl pays him another twenty bucks to retrieve them.

  Gosh dang it, I hate doing this to Wesley, I really do, but I can’t figure out how to get my butt to Hollywood without Joe DiMaggio paying my way. And I can’t figure out another way to get that Joe card and keep Mr. Clements off my back at the same time. It hurts my heart to say goodbye to Wesley like this, especially leaving him holding the bag, but I’ve got no choice.

  I can only hope Wesley somehow manages to dance between the raindrops and get off scot-free—and, actually, to increase the chances of that happening, I made Wesley promise over and over to wear the big yellow kitchen gloves when he opens Mr. Clements’ safe. But if, on the other hand, Wesley gets discovered—which certainly isn’t my hope—then at least I feel comfort knowing Wesley won’t be stuck in juvie for too long before he comes to meet me at the Hollywood bus station, as we’ve planned.

  I let out a long exhale and shift my position on the couch.

  I
sure did cry a river of tears saying goodbye to Wesley under the big oak tree early this morning, and so did he. I haven’t squeezed someone that tight and cried that hard since saying goodbye to Daddy all those years ago. I was a damned blubbering mess.

  This time, unlike three days ago, it was Wesley’s turn to reassure me. “Time’s gonna fly by,” he said, kissing my cheeks and lips and eyes. “We’ll be together again before you know it—and then we’ll never be apart again.”

  All I could do was whimper.

  “You got the meeting time and place memorized?” Wesley asked.

  I nodded so hard I thought my head was gonna fling off my neck.

  “Noon at the bus station in Hollywood, exactly two days after my eighteenth birthday,” Wesley reminded me. “That’s only three hundred and ninety-five days away. No sweat.”

  “Okay, Wesley,” I cried. “I’ll be there.”

  “But repeat it back to me,” he insisted.

  “Bus station in Hollywood. Two days after your eighteenth birthday. Exactly three hundred and ninety-five days from today. Noon.”

  “Promise you’ll be there, Buttercup.”

  “I promise, Wesley. Of course.” I kissed Wesley’s soft lips to seal my promise.

  The screen on the front door squeaks open, jolting me from my thoughts of Wesley, and Mrs. Clements waltzes into the room holding a bag of groceries. I stand up from the couch, hug her goodbye, and thank her for everything she’s done for me. Mrs. Clements hugs me back and tells me to keep in touch. She sheds a tear, which makes me shed a couple of my own, too, but only because I’m thinking about poor Wesley again. And then, without further ado, like so many eighteen-year-olds who’ve aged-out of this place before me, I head out the front door of the group home with my little suitcase in my hand, and never look back.

  Chapter 22

  Hollywood, California, 1990

  18 Years 5 Days Old

  736 Days Before Killing Kurtis

  The bus ride to Hollywood is interminable and insufferable and makes me want to murder more people, all at once, than I’ve ever wanted to murder in my whole life—and, for me, that’s saying a lot. Each and every person who sits next to me on each and every leg of my long and tortuous ride across half the country bores me half to death with their life story and their hopes and dreams and whatever big opportunity is luring them all the way out to California.

  Of course, even though I’m bored as hell, I smile politely and attentively during each and every conversation, and every one of my riding companions makes me promise to keep in touch in California. It just goes to show, yet again—everyone always wants the pretty people to like them.

  The very first thing I do on Day One in Hollywood is plunk down an entire month’s worth of rent on a little room above a liquor store, right on Sunset Boulevard, courtesy of Mr. Clements and his big wad of cash. To be perfectly honest, I’m not all that thrilled about the liquor store part of my living accommodations, but I’m most definitely pleased as punch about the Sunset Boulevard part of it. Regardless, it’s what I can afford right now so there’s no sense wishing things were any different. If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride.

  The second thing I do, even before going up to my new room, is ask the guy at the front desk if I can take a look at his phonebook. When I open that book, I go right to “W,” holding my breath, and scan the alphabetical listings all the way down to “W-i-l-b-e-r.” But, dang it, it isn’t there. It isn’t there. The list of names goes right from “Wilber, Catherine F.” to “ Wilcox, Alexander.” Shoot. I actually believed finding Daddy was going to be as simple as opening the phonebook, even after all these years.

  I look up from the phonebook, lost in thought for a moment. Gosh, maybe Daddy’s such a bigwig these days he doesn’t want people knowing his phone number? That could be it. Or maybe Daddy just doesn’t have a phone? All of a sudden, thinking of reasons why Daddy might not be listed in that big Los Angeles phonebook makes me nervous and anxious and almost verging on panic, so, I decide not to think about it for a few days.

  I move along to the third thing on my “Day One in Hollywood” list: visiting Grauman’s Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard. The minute I arrive, I kneel down on the cold cement and lay my hands on top of the handprints of Lana and then Marilyn—and boy-howdy, when my modern-day flesh touches the exact spots where those legendary beauties pressed their flesh, I experience something that can only be described as a spiritual awakening.

  I close my eyes and feel infused with a deep-in-my-bones understanding, a that’s-just-the-way-it-is kind of certainty about my higher purpose on this earth. If I didn’t know it before, I sure as heck know it now: I’ve been put on this earth to mesmerize people the way they did, only even more so—to carry their torch ever-farther into the catacombs of history. Yes, there’s no doubt in my mind I’m meant to be seen by audiences in cineplexes all over the world.

  With these deep thoughts bouncing around in my head on my way back to my room, I pop into a twenty-four-hour drugstore on Hollywood Boulevard and buy myself a big bottle of “Light Blonde Number 5.”

  Back in my little room, after I’ve treated my hair with the smelly chemicals and then dried and styled my new blonde mane into a perfect tumble of waves, I stare at myself in the mirror for the whole rest of the night. I can’t help but marvel at myself—I finally look like me.

  Of course, changing my hair is only part one of what I’ve got to do. The next morning, Day Two in Hollywood, I head out to tackle the second.

  I’m standing in front of a boxy, one-level building on Hollywood Boulevard. A large sign on the rooftop reads “Casanova Club” in big, swirling letters—and a neon sign flashing over the doorway says “Topless Cuties.” Yep, this place will do as well as any other.

  The burly man at the front door looks at me from head to toe. “You here for a job?”

  “No, sir. I’m just here to browse,” I say, smiling sweetly.

  He pauses, apparently confused. “Browse what?”

  “The girls.”

  His eyes brighten like I’ve said something naughty. “Well, well, well.” He chuckles wolfishly. “Hmm. We don’t normally allow ladies into the club... “

  I make my eyes wide and pleading and pout my lips in disappointment, too.

  “But I guess it couldn’t hurt if you’re just here to ‘browse.’” He chuckles again. “I’ll have to charge you, though, just like any other customer.”

  I nod my assent. “Thank you kindly, sir.”

  “That’ll be ten dollars.”

  I lay the cash into the man’s outstretched palm, snickering as I do. I’m sure Mr. Clements would be pleased as punch to know his nest egg just paid my way into a nudie bar.

  When I step inside the door of the club, I stop just past the entrance to let my eyes adjust in the dim light. There’s a softly lit stage jutting out into the middle of the room, and two girls are gyrating around on top of it wearing nothing but teeny-tiny undies. The girl with honey-blonde hair has boobs even smaller than mine. She’s dancing under a flashing sign that says, “Rhonda.” I don’t care about Rhonda. But the other girl, the one with long black hair and thick bangs whose sign flashes “Bettie,” well, her balloon-sized boobs are just about bursting off her tiny frame like they’re gonna pop off and zip around the room. Those boobs don’t look very pleasant to own, I must say, and they’re definitely not what I’m in the market to buy, but at least I know I’m in the right place.

  My eyes adjust to the dark room until I can make out an array of tables and chairs filled with men, including some particularly attentive ones seated along the perimeter of the jutting stage, right at the girls’ feet.

  I’ve never seen practically naked girls prancing around before, and I don’t quite know what to make of it. I’ve seen naked girls in my life, of course—nudie photographs of Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield in the biographies I’ve read about them, and also real-life girls without their clothes on, too, since I shared
my room at the group home with at least three other girls at any given time. But these two topless girls on stage aren’t frozen into seductive poses on a page, and they’re not young girls quietly changing into nightgowns, either. No, these two girls are jiggling and writhing around onstage for the world to see, right in front of a crowd of shouting strangers. I’m sure if Daddy were here, he’d call the whole situation “small-minded.”

  And yet, small-minded or not, I can’t stop looking at them and wondering a million things. Do these girls’ daddies know what they’re doing? And what are the girls thinking while they gyrate and writhe up there? Do they feel sort of silly, or even a little bit ashamed? Or are they just thinking la-la-la the entire time, the same as if they were playing a game of checkers or talking about the weather? Or, when they’re up on that stage and those men are staring at them and craning their necks and hooting at them and practically slobbering all over the stage, do the girls actually like it?

  “Are you here for a job?”

  I turn to look at the source of the raspy voice. It’s a short man with dark hair.

  “The man at the door let me pay ten dollars to come in,” I say. “I’m just here to browse.”

  The man frowns. “Browse? It’s a gentleman’s club, sweetheart. If you’re not here to dance, you can’t be here. Everyone’s already asking me if you’re a new girl.”

  “I just want to watch the dancers for a little while, sir—so I can find out what nudie-dancing’s all about, maybe try to get up the nerve to do it myself.” That last part’s a flat-out lie. I have no intention whatsoever of dancing in my skivvies for a crowd of—what? —forty men who’ve never done a dang thing in their sad-sack lives to deserve a personal glimpse of my titties.

  Why would I give this paltry group of men a gander at something no man has ever seen before? Unless each and every one of the men in this club is the head of a movie studio, then I can’t think of one thing that would persuade me to hop up there and jiggle my bits for them. My destiny is to inspire audiences in the tens of millions, not in the tens. Neither Lana nor Marilyn, or even Jayne, ever pranced around shaking their titties in a nudie bar, as far as I know, and I don’t plan to, either. But, of course, I don’t want to say any of this to Mr. Sourpuss because then he’ll kick me out, and being here’s the only way I can figure to get the information I need to advance one step closer to fulfilling my destiny.