More Stories from the Twilight Zone

by Carol Serling

  “Mmmwh,” she managed behind his hand. She had to be asleep. She was having a dream.

  Gently he pushed her back against the pillows, moving one clanking leg onto the bed. Her eyes widened. The sound she was hearing was the ocean, and she smelled salt and . . . whoa . . . him . . .

  “Nothing shall come between us. Nothing,” he whispered in a deep, masculine voice. With his other hand, he caressed her cheek. His fingertips were calloused. His eyes burned with lust.

  I am definitely asleep, she thought, as her heart pounded and she tingled all over. But I sure don’t feel like it.

  “I, Aidan, am here,” he declared, with a smoldering look as he trailed his fingertips over her mouth. “And all I want . . . is you.”

  In the morning, Deb jerked awake to the blaring alarm as the black construction paper cascaded, once again, to the floor. She rolled over the other way, and found Ellen’s book under her hip. She smiled. Nice dream. Then she laughed. Who was she kidding? It had been a great dream. The best dream of her life, in fact.

  But the morning was here way too early and she had carpool. She slung her legs over the bed.

  “Mom, there are ants everywhere!” Andy shouted.

  “You little freak!” Sarah screamed. “You freak, you freak! Mom! ”

  “Thank you so much for doing this,” Ellen said, taking the invitations as Deb blocked her view of the house once more. Ellen was wearing another Halloween-themed ensemble—a black sweater with silver moons over matching black trousers, and silver moons dangling from her ears. She even had a crescent-moon watch with a black leather band. “I hope you didn’t go to a lot of trouble.”

  “Oh, no, it was fine,” Deb lied. Her fingers were killing her. She had never found the good scissors. Andy had dribbled ketchup all over Sarah’s costume for her dance performance and Deb had spent the majority of the day first trying to clean it, then figuring out how to replace the ruined sections. Andy swore it was an accident. He’d been trying to kill the ants that had also invaded the bathroom. With ketchup. Kevin had done nothing but snuffle and cough on the couch.

  “Did you start the book?” Ellen asked. Her smile was sly.

  “Um, yes, it’s great,” Deb replied vaguely, trying to translate that smile, blazing with embarrassment over her hot, hot dream. As she looked down, she discovered a spot of ketchup on her black sweatshirt. Then she nearly choked as she noticed the time on Ellen’s half-moon watch. “Our cat has a vet appointment,” she announced.

  “Oh. My husband takes care of our dog.” Ellen smiled very sweetly. “If I could trouble you to make some cupcakes for the party?”

  Inwardly, Deb groaned. But she smiled and said, “Of course.”

  “Thank you so much. Well, I’ll get out of your hair.” She glanced at Deb’s hair, and Deb blanched. She’d been meaning to get a cut. . . .

  “You are perfect just the way you are,” Aidan murmured into her frizzy shag six hours later. Kevin was still on the couch, thank goodness. “I adore you.”

  “You’re really here,” Deb whispered, touching his broad chest with her fingertips. She’d been on page seventeen, third paragraph down, when suddenly he’d appeared, as he had the night before. Except tonight . . .

  . . . no chain mail.

  “Mom!” Sarah bellowed. “Mom, I need a towel!”

  She sighed. He caught her hand and brought it to his lips. “I am really here. And all I want is . . . you. Kiss me, my beauty.”

  “Mom!” Sarah cried. “There is cat hair all over the floor and my wet feet will get all gross! Mom!”

  “Shut up!” Andy shouted. Pounding rattled the hallway wall. “Me and Dad are watching the game!”

  “Stay here, with me,” Aidan begged her, grabbing her hand. “Stay here.”

  “Sarah needs a towel,” she told him.

  “But I need you.” He eased her back against her pillow. “I need you as no other needs you.”

  “Here!” Andy yelled. “Catch!”

  “Ouch! Mom!”

  “Stay.” He kissed her.

  And she stayed.

  “Thanks,” Deb said absently to Kevin, whom she had convinced to stay on the couch by claiming that she had caught his cold. He’d been there for four nights now. He seemed perfectly content, eating potato chips, drinking beer, channel surfing. As thunder rumbled overhead and rain poured down the sliding-glass door, she glided away, the hem of her light blue chenille bathrobe catching on one of the heaps of tissues, sending a cascade to the floor. In the hall, she stepped on a LEGO, and then on a wet washcloth.

  “We’re out of Sugar Pops,” Sarah informed her from the doorway of her room. “We’re out of everything. And I don’t have any more clean jeans.”

  “I’m so sorry, sweetie,” she said, gliding on.

  “What is wrong with you?” Sarah demanded, then huffed and slammed her door as Deb glided past. “I don’t know,” Sarah muttered behind the closed door. “I swear my mom has gone psycho.”

  Deb went into her bedroom . . . or rather, where her bedroom used to be. Now it was their secret tropical cove of passion. Aidan’s pirate ship, The Treasure, bobbed in the distance, and Aidan himself lay bare-chested in the fine filigree bed he had carried from his quarters aboard ship and settled firmly in the fine, warm sand. A canopy of shimmering Indian silk was strung from one gently curving palm tree to the other, and he was lying on his side, his broad chest glistening with a sheen of manly perspiration, his long brown hair hanging low. A parchment map was spread on the bed; he was drinking finely spiced rum from a sterling silver goblet. At his tanned elbow, an empty silver platter studded with jewels gleamed in the sun.

  “My love,” he said, eyes drinking in the sight of her. “I’ve been waiting an eternity for you.”

  “Sorry, sorry,” she murmured. “My family . . .” She shrugged and held out her hands.

  “I am your family now,” he said, reaching for her wrists and drawing her toward him. “Come to me, my beauty.”

  Her stomach growled. She had made tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner, and burned the last of the bread—her own sandwich—while reading chapter twenty. Thirty-six pages of love scene.

  She could hardly wait.

  She sat down beside him on the bed. His eyes blazed with pleasure. Her stomach growled again and she said, “What were you eating? Is there more?”

  “Iced shrimp and papaya,” he told her. “Of course there’s more.”

  He leaned over the side of the bed and brought up another platter laden with delicate pink shrimp and golden slivers of papaya. And chocolates.

  “You’re a lifesaver,” she murmured, as he began to feed her.

  “Yes, I really do still have a cold,” she told Kevin, blowing her nose as if to make a point. It had been a week. She looked down at the pile of tissues beside the couch, and wondered why on earth he hadn’t thrown them away himself. He was back at work, which got the daytime TV off, thank God.

  The hallway was littered with dirty clothes and there was a paper towel roll outside the bathroom. The kids had been making do since the toilet paper ran out. Kevin kept apologizing for forgetting to get some at the store on his way home from the strip of fast-food restaurants he had begun to frequent. Sarah wasn’t talking to Deb; she had forgotten to do the carpool and everyone had been late for school. Twice. She felt a twinge. Slight, but present.

  She heard someone crying in Sarah’s room.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with her, Andy,” Sarah said. “Maybe she’s got a fever and she’s delirious.”

  “But I have to bring the cupcakes to the Scout party. It’s my responsibility!” Andy ground out.

  “Maybe Dad can buy you some,” Sarah ventured.

  Deb stepped around the hallway clutter and went into the bedroom. And there he was, lying in bed, sipping rum and eating a banana. Sun-streaked highlights gleamed in his hair. When he saw her, he beamed with joy and held out the cup to her.

  “Where have you been, m
y beauty?” he demanded hotly. “The hours have dragged like years.”

  She climbed onto the bed. “I don’t suppose you know how to make cupcakes.”

  He slid his arms around her. “No, but I know how to make you happy.”

  Sighing, she picked up the goblet and swallowed down the rum. He kissed her. Again. And again. He ran his fingers through her hair and marveled aloud at how exquisitely, achingly beautiful she was. He wept with joy that they had found each other at last.

  “What about the cupcakes? I have to make cupcakes. I’m supposed to take them to Ellen’s after drop-off tomorrow.”

  He eased her onto her back and gazed with limpid desire into her eyes.

  “Forget them,” he urged her in his deep, barrel-chested voice. “There’s nothing but you . . . and me. Nothing in the world but our passion.”

  He was almost right about that. But Andy’s tears echoed in her mind as she slumbered beside Aidan. She tossed and turned. Then at four A.M., she got up and started making the batter. She’d bought all the makings the first day she’d read Aidan into her life. While digging for the extra package of butter in the freezer, she discovered a treasure trove of microwave meals and frozen vegetables. Kevin and the kids didn’t have to eat so much fast food. They’d had food in the house all along. But no one had looked for it. No one else seemed to be able to cook. And why was that?

  In the next room on the couch, Kevin snored on.

  Yawning, exhausted, Deb made chocolate cupcakes with orange frosting, each one topped with a gumdrop spider and legs of black licorice. Four dozen. Her eyes were bloodshot and lined with sandpaper by the time she finished, just as the sun came up. And as she awakened her son with the wonderful news, he just stared at her in horror.

  “Four dozen? You were supposed to make six dozen,” he said.

  She realized with dawning horror that he was right. She’d miscounted. She’d been too distracted—too tired, and too eager to get back in bed with Aidan.

  “Ellen, hi, I’m sorry,” she said, calling Ellen on her cell phone. “I hit a snag,” she said. “I’ll bring the cupcakes over a little later today.”

  “Oh,” Ellen said, sounding surprised. “All right.”

  Andy didn’t talk to her the entire way to school. He sat in the back, sulking beside Sarah, who was also sulking, because she was gaining weight and her face was breaking out from all the fast food.

  “Sarah, if you don’t like all the stuff Daddy’s been buying, why haven’t you zapped any of the meals in the freezer?” Deb asked her daughter.

  “Me?” Sarah asked, stunned. “You’re the mom.”

  Deb jerked as if she’d been pelted with a water balloon. She blinked, stunned, at what a curt, spoiled, thoughtless child her daughter was. And her son, glowering at her because she was two dozen cupcakes short of a Halloween party.

  I’m the mom, Deb thought, as she dropped her kids off at their schools. It became a litany with the swish-swoosh of the windshield wipers as the sleet crackled down on her windshield. The mom, the mom, the mom.

  She did feel guilty, but more than that, she was angry. She went home to her filthy house, half-covered with ants, and the cupboards and trash cans overflowing with fast-food containers and tissues; and the nest Kevin had made on the couch, and the remote on the floor. She looked at it all and she blasted into the bedroom, where she found Aidan lying in bed, the light in his eyes leaping to life as she stomped toward him.

  “At last,” he said. “How I have been pining for you, my beauty.”

  She stared at him. “Do you love me?”

  His chest swelled. His eyes welled with tears. “Oh, yes. I love you, with all my heart, and my soul. You are my life. Without you, I’m . . . I’m nothing.”

  “Then why didn’t you help me with the cupcakes last night?” she demanded. “Because I’m the mom?”

  “You are my one true love.” He looked puzzled. “Come to me, be with me . . .”

  “I can’t,” she said miserably. “It’s all getting worse. It’s going to be overwhelming if I don’t get back to work.” She broke down sobbing. “Because I’m the mom.”

  “No, you are my beloved. My darling. My life.” He enveloped her in a loving embrace and kissed her tears away. “Don’t cry, my heart, my wonder, my sweetling.”

  “Can’t you help me?” she asked him. “If you love me?”

  “Help you . . . yes, I will help you, yes, my darling,” he said. “We’ll weigh anchor in an hour and be gone from here forever.” He pulled the rubber band from her hair and clutched her face, kissing her long and hard.

  “My beauty.”

  “Make it two hours,” she pleaded.

  “For you . . . an eternity,” he whispered moistly into her ear. “Soon, we will leave all this behind.”

  She left the bedroom, but she didn’t make the extra two dozen cupcakes. Trembling, she loaded what she had into the car and drove straight to Ellen’s house. She’d never been there before, but as her arms shook around the Tupperware containers loaded in her arms, she noted the impeccable lawn, the little Japanese footbridge, and the stone lanterns on either side of the entrance. WELCOME FROM THE DEWITT FAMILY, said a little sign on the door with two big cherry blossoms and five little ones.

  Balancing the containers, she rang the doorbell and tried to catch her breath. She thought she was going to faint. As dots of yellow swam before Deb’s eyes, Ellen opened the door. Every hair in place, she was dressed in her black moon sweater, jeans, and black Uggs. She was taking off a pair of rubber gloves.

  “Oh, good,” she said. “Come on in. I was just cleaning up.”

  Deb stumbled across the foyer into a homey living room filled with antiques. Pushed against the wall beneath a painting of an old forest, there were five large plastic bins, each one labeled with a name: SEAN, MARCIE, HAILEY, DOUG, STEPHANIE. The names of her children.

  Deb and Ellen went down a hall where various certificates were framed—soccer, softball, good citizenship, honor roll—and a large white board labeled “CHORES.” The children’s names were written there, too, with a series of checkmarks beside each one. To the right of that were at least half a dozen calendars, hung up side by side, each with a different theme—puppies, baseball, France, sunsets, motorcycles. The squares for October were all filled in, with different handwriting for each calendar.

  Ellen caught her looking. “Each of my children has their own calendar,” she said. She laughed. “Of course I have one for my husband, and one for me. And I keep it all on a spreadsheet.”

  Deb stared at Ellen as if she were speaking a foreign language. She swayed behind Ellen as she led her into her kitchen. It was blue and white, and it was immaculate, from the white grout between the white tile squares on the counter, to the white tile floor and the white appliances. Tidy refrigerator art. A pumpkin candle sat in the kitchen bay window, overlooking a perfectly manicured yard. There was one orange coffee cup decorated with a black cat in the dish drainer. Ellen laid the rubber gloves on a stand that hung over the sink, wiped her hands on a brown dish towel with a smiling jack-o’-lantern on it, and reached for the containers.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, there are only four dozen,” Deb said in a rush, “but I had to talk to you. What did you do? Did you come back, or . . . or . . . ?” She trailed off as Ellen cocked her head quizzically and set the containers beside each other, burping open the nearest one.

  “What adorable cupcakes. Did you run out of supplies? I always keep some mixes on hand. I get them when they’re on sale.”

  Deb stared at her. “Ellen, what did you do about Aidan?”

  “Aidan?” Ellen said, opening her cupboard. She pulled out a box of chocolate cake mix. “Who—”

  “You know,” Deb said. “The man . . . in the book.”

  “Oh.” She laughed. “You see, I have it all blocked out.” She smiled at Ellen. “On my calendar.” As Deb blinked, she walked back to the row of calendars and pointed to the one closest to them,
themed with sunsets. She tapped her finger on Wednesday’s square. “See? Nine to ten P.M. tonight. Mom’s Reading Time. I’m halfway through a great new one about a highlander.” She leaned toward Deb. “Scorching. I’ll give it to you after I’m finished.”

  “Reading time,” Deb said, trying to make sense. “Scorching.”

  “My husband teases me about my romance novels, but I’d go crazy if I didn’t have some ‘me’ time, you know?”

  “Me,” Deb said.

  “No one better interrupt my reading time,” Ellen declared. “It’s my lifesaver.”

  Deb flopped backward against the wall. Ellen peered at her. “Are you all right?”

  “Dinner,” she blurted desperately, scanning the chore list. “Do they make dinner? Do you have . . . what about the store? If you run out of toilet paper . . .”

  “Let me get you a glass of water.” She left Deb, who had slid halfway down the wall, and went back into the kitchen. She got Deb some water and brought it back to her. “It’s Doug’s turn to make dinner. Of course all of them have chores. And if they don’t do them, well, they might say I’m too hard on them but it’s all about consistency, you know?” She wrinkled her nose. “And boundaries.”

  “Oh, my God, I’m going crazy,” Deb said, gulping down the water. “Completely crazy.”

  “Is there someone I can call?” Ellen ventured, taking the empty glass. “Do you need something, some medication or—”

  “I need to go,” Deb announced. She pushed herself away from the wall.

  “You can keep the book,” Ellen assured her. “I just recycle them when I’m finished.”

  Deb lurched to the door. “Okay. Okay, thank you.”

  “Are you sure you can drive? Is there anything I can do? I’ll make the last two dozen cupcakes. Don’t worry about that.”

  Ellen hovered at the door of her perfect home as Deb staggered out to her car. Her messy, stinky car that was almost out of gas again.