"What are you, the greeting committee?" Lydia asked as she pushed her way past Sarah into the house. Dorcas avoided looking at Sarah as she followed.
"Lydia! Dorcas! Come here this instant!" their father's voice boomed from the study.
"Now you're gonna get it," Sarah said as she closed the door behind her.
"I got it last night," Lydia muttered, "long, hard, and slow."
"You're nothing but a cheap tramp," Sarah spat. "You're disgusting. You make me sick."
"Aw, shit. No Christmas present from Sarah this year."
"And you, Dorcas," Sarah said. "After what you've been through? Where on earth is your common sense?"
Dorcas fidgeted with the edge of her leather bomber jacket. "I . . . I just wanted to hear Artie—"
"Yes, and see that Peter of yours!"
Lydia chuckled as she walked toward the study. "A dork with a peter. Not bad, Sarah."
"You're disgusting!" Sarah shouted at Lydia, and then turned back to Dorcas. "Do you want to end up back in the psychiatric ward? Is that what you want?"
"I didn't drop any acid," Dorcas replied defensively. "I didn't even smoke any pot."
"Oh, sure. You expect me to believe that, I suppose?"
At age nineteen, Dorcas might have been expected to put her sixteen-year-old sister in her place, but such self-assertion was alien to her nature. "Honest," she insisted. "All I had was one beer—" Her words were interrupted by sounds from the den: Lydia laughing, Dr. Ostlich yelling, and then a crisp, resounding slap. Dorcas blanched. "Oh, Lordie," she whispered, and then went to the study.
She entered to see Lydia's face growing red with rage and then noticed a thin trickle of blood on the corner of her mouth. Tears were welling up in Lydia's eyes, but she seemed determined not to give her father the satisfaction of seeing her weep. "You bastard," she spat, trembling with rage. Ostlich swung his heavy hand at her again, but she stepped back out of his reach. "Too fast for you, Dad. i guess it bothers you that the only time you get to touch me anymore is when you hit me."
He stepped forward and raised his hand to strike at her again. "Daddy, don't, please," Dorcas cried. "We didn't do anything wrong, honest we didn't—"
"That's not what Lydia just told me," Sarah said vindictively. "She just told me she slept with somebody last night."
Lydia's eyes blazed with venom. "I swear, I'm gonna kill you someday, you little bitch."
"Slut," Sarah shot back.
"Stop it, please, all of you." Dorcas pleaded, beginning to weep. "I just can't stand this."
"Sure," Sarah said, "you two cause all the trouble in this family and then you go into your nervous-breakdown act to try to get sympathy."
"Shut the fuck up, Sarah," Lydia said. "Leave Dorcas alone."
"Lydia," her father declared, "Sarah is just concerned about Dorcas. And she's concerned about you as well, just as I am." He tried to lower his agitated voice, and when he spoke, it sounded like an irritating whine. "Don't you understand that your behavior is going to destroy you?"
Lydia closed her eyes and forced herself to calm down. "Look, Dad," she said evenly, "all we did was go down to Long Island to hear Artie Winston play guitar at ZolIs—"
"And stay out overnight without permission!"
"We're nineteen years old. Why the hell should we have to get permission?"
He shook his head, intending to seem understand-ing but firm. "As long as you're living under my roof, you simply must abide by my rules."
Lydia glowered at him. "Abide by your rules, Daddy dear? Do I understand you right? I have to do whatever you say? Do you think I'm gonna let you start that shit with me again, you son of a bitch?"
"Now, Lydia, stop it!" he commanded. "That's not what I meant, and you know it. That's all in the past. I'm worried about your present, and about your future. Those boys you hang around with are no damned good, Lydia, and—"
"That's the problem, isn't it! You're all pissed off because I get it on with Clay, while you . . . while you . . ." She could not finish the sentence. Instead she glared at him hatefully for a moment and then stormed out of the room.
Sarah put her hand gently on her father's arm. "She's just mean and rotten, Daddy. Don't you let her upset you."
Ostlich gave Sarah a grateful smile, squeezed her hand quickly, and then turned to Dorcas and sighed. "And you! Dorcas, I would have thought that one breakdown would be enough for anyone. Don't you realize that those reprobates and all their drugs and alcohol are what caused your problem in the first place?"
"Daddy," she whined, "all I did was listen to—"
"And what were you doing at the old Sweet house the other day?" he demanded, adding before she could reply, "And don't tell me the same lies you told me before. I don't believe for a minute that you felt lonely for old Edith Sweet and you like to keep her house clean. Why, the woman's been dead for five years!"
"It's true, Daddy," she wept. "Miss Sweet was always so nice to me and always made me feel so welcome when I'd visit her—"
"Dorcas, I want the truth!"
"That is the truth, honest to God. I love that old house, and I loved that old woman, and I always felt so . . . so good there, so peaceful and calm . . . and Miss Sweet was like a . . . like a grandmother to me . . . she loved me, Daddy, and I loved her. . . .
"I see," he said skeptically. "And Lydia, who doesn't even wash her hair half the time, went to help you clean the house?"
"She had nothing better to do that day, that's all. Honest, Daddy, that's the whole truth." She paused for a moment. "In fact, I wouldn't mind helping those two old men keep the house up, if they want me to."
"Oh, that's delightful." Sarah laughed. "Cleaning house for them!"
"Yes indeed," Ostlich agreed. "To your long list of subhuman friends you now want to add a heathen and a deformed simpleton."
"Daddy, I—"
"Go to your room," he ordered. She hurried away without another word, and Ostlich shook his head as Sarah leaned her head against his shoulder. "Thank God for you, Sarah," he muttered, putting his arm around her waist.
"Thank God for you, Daddy," she replied.
Dorcas went slowly, mournfully up the stairs to the second floor of the old farmhouse and entered Lydia's room to find her twin sister angrily throwing clothing into a battered old knapsack. Her eyes widened. "Lydia! What are you doing?"
"What's it look like I'm doing?"
"It looks like you're packing."
Lydia laughed humorlessly. "Bull's-eye."
"But we just got home . . . I mean . . . Lydia, what. . .
"Obey his fUcking goddamn half-assed rules as long as I'm living under his fucking goddamn half-assed roof," she said. "So I'm getting the hell out of here."
"But . . . but where are you gonna go?"
"To Clayton's," she replied simply.
Dorcas frowned, distressed by the thought of her sister leaving her alone with Sarah and their father. "Clay never asked you to move in with him. I know you're stuck on him, and he seems to like you an awful lot, but . . ."
"So we'll see how much he likes me. At the very least he's gotta let me crash there for a while. I mean, I let him fuck me often enough. At least he owes me a roof!"
Dorcas was once again on the verge of tears. "But you and he aren't . . . I mean, you slept with Artie just last night!"
"Yeah, and Russell too. So what? So I got a weakness for guitarists and radicals." She slammed the suitcase shut and snapped the catch. "What do you think, that I'm the only girl Clay messes around with?"
"But . . . but . . ." Dorcas was trying desperately to find an argument that would keep her sister at home. "But how will you get up the mountain to Clay's?"
"I'll drive my motorcycle," Lydia replied, throwing the knapsack across her shoulder and bounding down the stairs.
"But the motorcycle doesn't have any brakes!" Dor-cas shouted after her.
"So what?" Lydia responded. "The whole drive is uphill." Her words were followed by the slam
of the front door and the boom of their father's voice.
Dorcas sat down on the edge of her sister's bed and looked out the window at the dusky sky. I can't stay here if Lydia leaves, she thought miserably. I'll just die if I'm here all alone with Daddy and Sarah. The sound of a motorcycle revving in the garage beside the house reached her, and she sighed loudly. Then she got up from the bed and went downstairs.
"Where does your sister think she's going?" her father demanded as she reached the bottom of the stairs.
"I don't know," she lied. "For a ride, I guess." She headed toward the front door with an overstated air of casualness.
"Dorcas, come back here!"
She turned quickly and said, "I'm just going out for a walk," she said, her voice shaking. "I just want some air, that's all. I'll be back soon, honest. I'm just going for a walk, Daddy."
His eyes bored into her as if to take her measure, and then he said, "Well . . . well, all right, but don't be out after dark."
"Okay, sure, I promise," she said, and then was out the door. Before her feet hit the bottom step, she knew where she was going. She needed to go to the only place where she had ever felt safe and secure and loved.
As Dorcas walked slowly along the roadside toward the river Lydia was barreling up toward the Saunders property. It was not quite true that the motorcycle had no brakes, but they were spongy and only intermittently effective, so she found it necessary to downshift on occasion. At one point she almost flipped the bike over, but managed to pull out of it safely. She reduced her speed after that and fifteen minutes later found herself at the foot of the dirt road that led up the mountain. The bike stalled at that point and refused to start up again, so she went the rest of the way on foot.
She was uncomfortably winded by the time she reached the trailer, and leaned against a tree to catch her breath. She heard voices and laughter coming from the trailer and decided that before entering she had better make sure Clayton was not entertaining another girl. She would be hurt and angry if he were, despite the things she had said to Dorcas a short time before; but she would be mortified if she burst in on them unexpectedly.
She walked to the trailer quietly and peeked in through the window. Clayton, Sean, and Rebecca were sitting on the floor taking turns sucking on the tube of a large, ornate hookah. Sean was smiling, Rebecca was laughing, and Clayton was shouting at Sean.
"That's what happens when you lead a life of crime. Goddamn kids today. You give 'em a good education, you do your best to bring 'em up right, you work hard all your life to give 'em a good home, and what do they do? They flush it all down the goddamn toilet. Bunch of goddamn, good-for-nothing bums." He took a drink from the can of tepid beer that rested on the floor beside him. "And why the hell can't you punks stick to good old-fashioned drugs like beer? Why you gotta mess around with that RSD stuff and that XYZ and that IRS and that marry-chu-honor. Just look at you. Look at you! With that hair you look like a goddamn girl, for Christ's sake! An ugly girl!"
"Clay," Sean said, laughing softly, "cut it out, will you? One to five on probation ain't funny."
"Goddamn fags, ruining the country," Clayton screamed. "But don't you think we're agonna let it git no further, no sirree. We know who's behind this, all them commie folksingers and them pinko professors and them nigger dope dealers and them goddamn smelly hippies!"
Lydia pushed open the trailer door and smiled at Clayton. "Hiya, Clay."
"Hey, mamma," he yelled. "Show us your bazoombies!"
Lydia glanced at Rebecca. "He's Harry the Hard Hat tonight?"
"Just for the past few minutes," she replied, shifting closer to Sean so that Lydia could sit on the floor next to Clayton. "Before that he was Billy the Bumpkin."
"Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain," Sean muttered.
Lydia laughed, relaxed in the free surroundings and relieved to be away from her father. "Sean, did you memorize the Wizard of Oz or something? Thanks," she said as Rebecca handed her the hookah tube and Clayton went into the kitchen.
"Best movie ever made," Sean replied. "I've seen it fifty times."
"He drives me nuts when it's on TV," Rebecca added. "He sits there and recites the whole fucking movie from start to finish, every single word."
Lydia inhaled the hashish smoke, held it in briefly, and then let it out. "Where'd you get this, Becky? This is great hash."
"It's Sean's."
Lydia turned to him. "You had this with you all the way up here and you didn't share it with anybody in the car?"
He smiled at her. "Nope."
"What a rat!"
"Yup."
Clayton sat back down and handed Lydia a beer. "So to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?" She summarized for him the events that had just transpired in her house, and when she was finished, he shook his head. "Bummer," he said.
"Really," she replied.
"You shouldn't have left Dorcas there all by herself," Rebecca said quietly.
"Hey, if she wants to leave, she can leave. I'm sick and tired of being her keeper, you know?"
"She isn't strong like you, Lyd. You remember how she acted when your mother . . . when she like passed away. . . . "
"You mean when she killed herself?" Lydia asked evenly. "You don't have to be afraid to say it. It don't matter to me." She paused. "I mean, I loved her and I miss her and I wish she hadn't done it, but I'm not ashamed of it or anything. I mean, it was all Dad's fault anyway. Sure as hell wasn't mine."
"Yeah, sure, right," Rebecca said quickly. "But I mean, Dorcas really kinda flipped out when it happened, and then when she took that acid and really went nuts . . ."
"Look, Becky," Lydia said tiredly. "I love Dork. I'm closer to her than I am to anybody in the world, and I care about her and I make sure she gets out and sees people and goes places and all that shit. But I don't need a goddamn shadow, you know? She knows where I am right now. If she wants to come here, too, fine. If not, fuck her."
"I'd love to," Clayton said as he relit the hookah. "It sounds so delighfully incestuous."
Lydia forced herself to laugh, though she did not find this jocular reference to incest at all amusing, "Clay, you're such a pig."
Rebecca saw Lydia's hands shaking slightly. The girls served each other as confidantes, and so she knew why this particular conversation caused Lydia so much pain. "Clay," she said seriously, "cut it out, will you?"
Clay looked at Sean, his eyes twinkling. "They think I'm kidding."
"You better be!" Lydia said in a tone not quite flippant.
"Just think about it," he said, and then inhaled some hashish smoke. "Identical twins. What a threesome it would make! Two identical mouths, four identical legs, four identical tits, two identical—"
"Clayton . . ." Lydia warned. Even though she was pretending to be a good sport, this oft-repeated fantasy of his made her very uncomfortable.
"But to tell you the truth, it's Sarah I'd like to get between the sheets," he mused.
"With that rod she's got stuck up her ass?" Sean asked.
Clayton shrugged. "Might make her tighter."
"Stop it, Clayton," Lydia insisted, punching him in the arm just a bit too hard for it to be playful. "I don't think this is funny, okay?"
He relented. "Okay, okay, just kidding."
"Yeah, I'll bet you are," she muttered.
Rebecca did not find the conversation amusing either, so she changed the subject. "Let's go do something. If we just sit around here smoking hash, we're all gonna be asleep in a half hour."
"Let's go drinking at your boyfriend's place," Sean suggested.
"Huh?"
"Your boyfriend. You know, Alex Sonovbitch."
"Oh, Al." She laughed. "You know, I went into his bar yesterday, looking for Clay, and I swear he almost had a heart attack from having to talk to me."
Sean smiled and shook his head. "You're cruel."
"I am not. He loves it. It's probably the high point of his day."
"You gotta watch we
ird old men like him, Becky. He might really get mad about you messing with his head."
"Alex? Don't be silly. He's a pussycat."
Sean took his turn with the pipe stem and then asked, "What's his problem, anyway? What's he so bitchy about all the time?"
She shrugged. "Beats me. He isn't getting any, that's for sure, and I think it's driving him nuts. Every time I see him he stares at my boobs like he can't quite figure out what they are."
"So why doesn't he go to the whorehouse in Newburgh and get his horns trimmed, if that's the problem?"
"Alex part with twenty-five bucks!" Clayton exclaimed. "Are you kidding?"
"And just how do you know how much it costs at the whorehouse in Newburgh?" Lydia asked evenly, leveling her eyes at him.
Sean laughed loudly. "Whoops!"
"I've heard tell, I've heard tell, yup, yup," Clayton replied, slipping into his Billy the Bumpkin persona.
"Very funny," Lydia muttered.
"Look, let's go do something," Rebecca repeated. "And I don't want to just go to Al's place. He waters down the beer, there's no jukebox, and I hate that stupid fucking bowling machine of his."
Lydia's eye lit up with a sudden inspiration. "Hey! You guys haven't heard about it!"
"Heard about what?" Rebecca asked.
Clayton passed the pipe stem to Sean. "What are you talking about, Lyd?"
She looked in turn at Clayton, Sean, and Rebecca as she asked, "How would you guys like to see a real live, honest-to-God, genuine, dyed-in-the-wool goblin?"
The same dream, always the same dream.
Time passes and the details of memory shift their forms, becoming other than they once were. Small things assume centricity in the dream memory and become large and awful, while things great and majestic shrink into nothingness. Seasons merge and blend, events partake of each other, and the past fact drifts far from the present memory, and memory is influenced by dreams, and dreams reflect the imperfection of the aging, fading mind.
What had happened on that strange and terrible day? Had it been as he now dreamed it? Had it been otherwise? Is the waking memory the reality, or is the sleeping dream the reality?
Grogo the Goblin Page 7
