RATTLEMAN: Praise for 18 Seconds 'Excellent! Stephen King

by George D. Shuman

  Kendrick’s was not the kind of place that they usually met for a drink. Carol preferred the more upscale bars like in Georgetown where she was routinely greeted by name. But it was Carol who insisted they have a drink on Judy’s birthday and Carol who decided Kendrick’s was to be the place.

  Judy took the handrail and descended a set of concrete steps to a basement, sirens wailing toward GW Hospital on Pennsylvania Avenue. She tried to recall Carol’s exact words.

  “Don’t forget to wear a skirt ’cause the flashy lure gets the fish.” It was one of her cutesy sayings.

  “We’re talking young crowd here, definitely a skirt, and keep it short. Wouldn’t want to embarrass me on your thirtieth birthday.”

  But that was Carol’s way: Carol always light and whimsical, Judy dark and brooding.

  In many ways it was Carol who had saved her. Carol was the kind of friend that would drag her out on weekends when she would rather sleep through the day. Carol haranguing her about wearing pants suits that she called Judy’s government blues, urging her to dress up for the endless string of parties that appeared like magic on Carol’s kitchen calendar.

  Judy didn’t always go along with her friend. Often she dug in and stayed on her couch. But in truth she considered Carol the only friend she had left, and when Carol was overly persistent she acquiesced out of fear. She didn’t want Carol to stop asking her out altogether. Carol, she had come to believe, was the last thing on the planet she had left to lose.

  Tonight was one of those nights she had felt compelled to go along.

  The room was dark and the bar stools were heaving, day shift from George Washington Hospital still wearing their scrubs. Carol wasn’t there when she arrived, which she considered odd since Carol got off work an hour before she did.

  Judy found a stool at the end of the bar and ordered a Chardonnay, wondering if she should try Carol’s cellphone, deciding after a minute to wait. Even a fender bender could confound traffic this hour of the day.

  She stared at framed caricatures on the wall: man on a surfboard with wavy blond hair and piano-key sized teeth, a woman in a polka dot bikini with a hula-hoop around her waist. A door slammed shut behind her, LADIES’ ROOM plaque above a half torn poster of Michael Phelps. For a long moment she looked at the door, paint peeling above an old brass knob. She began to feel queasy. She turned slowly in her stool and looked down at the rail, rubbed the wood with her fingers where someone had scratched the initials DRG next to an old cigarette burn. The feeling of dread started to come over her. Like the dread she’d felt at Quantico just moments before her round of fire. Pre-panic they called it; those few moments before an attack. She could still remember standing there, the ever-present smell of cordite in the air. But this time the cordite smelled like burnt hair, and the pall of dread wrapped its cold arms around her.

  The room began to seem smaller. She looked at the red exit sign over the front door, trying to judge the number of steps. She wanted her check, but the bartender was busy with a customer. She covered her mouth with her hand, hiding the rhythm of forced breathing. And thought suddenly about her father.

  Until last month he had been only a vague childhood memory. He had died when she was only eight, not long before her mother suffered a stroke and was confined to bed in a nursing home.

  It had now been twenty-two weeks since her daughter Lynn died of SIDS, twenty-one weeks since Tom packed his bags and walked away, fourteen since she had returned to work and discovered nothing would get better, that nothing would really change.

  She lost touch with her friends, people who found it uncomfortable to talk about their happy lives. Carol was the exception, probably because they were such different people. Judy was the conservative who shunned societies and associations; Carol a card-carrying member of every fervent cause.

  The bartender turned her way and Judy raised a hand. He started toward her, but a pitcher was thrust before him and he stopped to take an order. The couple sitting next to her poured an envelope full of vacation photographs on the bar. She shivered as a siren wailed on the streets above.

  It was odd, she thought, how quickly life turned around. One day you were making plans for the future and the next you were thrown into a maelstrom of despair and confusion, hanging onto sanity by a thread. And it was never the same afterward. Once you had reached the edge you never returned.

  The ladies’ room door slammed behind her and she winced. One thousand one, one thousand two …

  It was her psychiatrist who had probed for memories about her father. Judy had tried to conjure an image of the man and realized how little she remembered. She knew she was in her bedroom playing with a dollhouse on the day he died. Her mother had said she found his body in his office and a neighbor came to take her away as ambulances were arriving. One year later her mother suffered a paralyzing stroke. They had nurses in the house ever after. Her mother died when she was away at college. The family house was sold to pay for all the years of medical care. It was at her funeral that she learned from an aunt that her father hadn’t died of a heart attack. That he had shot himself in the head.

  The bartender coughed and she found him staring at her with raised eyebrows. She glanced at the empty glass in front of her and mouthed the word “check.” As the bartender walked away her Blackberry began to vibrate. She took it from her belt expecting to see Carol’s name. The readout said ‘Private.’

  She hesitated a second, then pressed TALK. The couple sitting next to her poured yet another envelope full of Disney World photographs on the bar. There was a metallic noise on the line and then the connection went dead and a text message popped up that read ‘Happy Birthday!’

  She put her phone down on the bar and was so absorbed in paying the check she was completely taken by surprise when Carol rushed up and threw her arms around her. “Happy Birthday!” Carol said, grinning; there were a half dozen friends standing behind her.

  Judy smiled as they hugged, then turned to acknowledge the others and by the grace of God or the complexity of the human brain, the panic-stricken moment passed.

  Conversation was still a little awkward: people no longer asked how she was doing. No one patted her reassuringly on the back. No one wanted to say the wrong thing or talk about their husbands and kids. Judy had to smile over the composition of Carol’s gathering. One of the men, she had once admitted to Carol, was cute.

  The party broke up by ten. Carol was working on the last pitcher of beer, talking about who had come and watching young couples enter from the movie theatre that let out across the street.

  “What about Troy and how he was looking at you tonight?”

  “Shut up,” Judy said.

  “Wouldn’t you just like him with his shirt off one time?”

  “Shut up!”

  “You going to be an old maid the rest of your life?”

  “It’s just the last thing on my mind right now,” Judy said and she told Carol about what happened at the range. “I thought I was doing okay,” she said. “And then I’m standing there with my hand on my gun, my shirt soaked with sweat and I’m shaking like a little girl. I can’t even pull it out of the holster.”

  “Have you been sleeping?” Carol asked.

  “A little better,” Judy lied.

  “Other panic attacks?”

  Judy shook her head.

  The bartender was polishing glasses, a muted episode of Law and Order playing out above the bar.

  Judy heard laughter erupt at the end of the room, loud, loose, carefree laughter and she tried to recall the last time she had such a feeling.

  “You know you need more time. Why don’t you take your boss’s advice and put in for a sabbatical.”

  Carol was a mocha-colored pixie with sassy red hair. She wore dangling red earrings and rings on all fingers. There was also some jewelry under her blouse.

  “You know, I’ve always told you that you needed to deal with this before you can deal with anything else. I’ve been telling you that
for months.”

  “I am dealing with it,” Judy retorted. “I’m seeing a shrink. What else can I do?”

  Carol didn’t answer.

  Judy blotted one of her eyes with a napkin. “Right now the job is all I have. You and the job, and I feel like I’m going to lose that too.”

  “Don’t think like that, girl. No one is going to get rid of you because you’re going through a rough period. If next week comes and you still have a problem you just tell them you need more time.”

  Judy smiled. “You don’t know the government.”

  “Then to hell with the government. You went to law school. Take the bar and practice like your father. You’ve got a lot more choices than me, Judy. Look at me. I’ve got a High School education.”

  Judy didn’t look convinced.

  “Besides, it’s never going to get that far.” Carol made a gesture with her hand. “You’ll do fine next week and then all this worry will be behind you.” She leaned over to fill Judy’s wine glass with the dregs of her pitcher.

  Judy tasted the warm beer, made a face and quickly set it down. “You know Tom never wanted to be married to me in the first place. He just didn’t want anyone else to have me.” She blew her nose in a napkin and wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands. “I don’t think he was ever happy we had Lynn.”

  Carol snorted, but then Tom had never been high on Carol’s list.

  “I used to tell Lynn every night when I rocked her to sleep, that I would always be there for her. And I couldn’t even keep my first promise.” A tear rolled down Judy’s face and clung to her chin.

  Carol reached out and wiped it away. “Things happen, Judy. Babies die, people divorce. It’s called life. We all have to go on.” She took her friend’s hand. “I’m sorry, hon. I know that sounds weak, but there are people in the world that really care about you. I care about you.”

  Judy looked at her, half listening, half drunk. She picked up a paper coaster and tore off a chunk. “I just feel really old tonight,” she said. “Old and empty.”

  Carol frowned, deciding to fill her own mug with the remains of the pitcher, but then pushed it away and started rummaging through her purse. “Look, kiddo,” Carol said excitedly. “I got you something.” She handed Judy a small gift-wrapped box.

  Judy blinked several times to clear her eyes and then she opened it. It was a small gold cross on a chain.

  “I know you’ve had a lot of hard knocks lately and thought what the hell, could it hurt?”

  “It’s lovely.” Judy laughed, tears beginning to well again. She threw her arms around Carol and began to cry. “Oh, thank you,” she sobbed. “It’s just beautiful.” She held it in her hand. “You really think there’s a heaven, Carol?”

  “You mean with angels and all that shit?” Carol had heard all this before. Every time Judy drank too much.

  She pulled her friend close and gave her a hug. “Yeah, Judy. Why not?”

  “Lynn would be there,” Judy whispered.

  “Yes, Lynn would be there. Of course she’d be there.” Carol shook her head. “So you want to get home now?”

  “Yeah, let’s get out of here.” Judy pushed the chair away noisily and got to her feet.

  Carol smiled weakly. “Happy birthday.”

  Chapter 6

  Iron Mountain, West Virginia

  Rolfe Christian Ledder stepped out of the trees on Cemetery Hill. The graveyard smelled of honeysuckle and ruptured earth. There was a rectangular hole no larger than a child. It reminded him of a day when he and his sister took turns lying in an open grave to see what it felt like.

  Funerals had always terrified him in his youth. Long processions of mourners walking behind horses pulling black draped coffins, and the hollow peel of the church bell that tolled once for every year the person had lived. It was the funerals where the bell only rang a handful of times that scared him the most.

  He raised his eyes to a single leaden cloud, felt its chill when it passed over the sun. The grass bent low as a breeze rippled across the hill and a feeling of terror settled over him. The cloud lingered a long moment, then dispersed in wisps of smoky tendrils. He stared at the sun for as long as he could, wondering what it meant.

  He looked at the soap colored tombstones and the inscriptions obscured by centuries of wind and rain. His sister was buried just next to his mother and he lay down upon her grave, remembering her face, knowing that she was living in Hell and that one day soon he would join her.

  A distant truck blasted its air horn and he heard an engine growl. Quills Landing, at the foot of the hill, had once been a bustling river port full of barges laden with coal and timber. Now it was a freight hub, filled with fueling stations and earth rumbling trucks that buzzed on and off the interstate, like bees gathering pollen.

  He followed the old footpath that descended the hillside, knees brushing hay as grasshoppers snapped stem to stem. The roof of the Pentecostal Church appeared. The cross on top was leaning to one side. He stopped in a heavy thicket above the parking lot. All evidence of paint on the cinderblock building had long ago peeled away. The air was dry and smelled of diesel.

  Rolfe heard the clank of metal on metal and parted the brush. He watched Reverend Holland reach to pick up a horseshoe, and when the old man stood up he favored one leg, shoes dragging noisily across the heavy gravel.

  He looked much older this year, his tall body stooped, his jowls swollen and his skin the color of purple. He wore the usual short-sleeve dress shirt and blue jeans with suspenders, white socks and heavy black shoes.

  Rolfe’s mother had been there on the day the Lord chose Holland as a preacher. It was at a fall revival on the banks of Soapy Creek, she’d told him. A crowd had gathered to be baptized before winter’s first snow. His mother said that people came from many miles away, everyone waiting to be dunked in the icy river by old Reverend Elbuck. Horses stamped and wagon wheels creaked. Families huddled under blankets, sharing bread and apples and cider.

  Morning drew to afternoon and the people grew restless. A voice began to rise up out of the crowd, wanting to know if there wasn’t anyone among them who’d had the calling. One who could take Reverend Elbuck’s place and baptize them before winter.

  His mother said that Holland was uncertain at first, but he rose to his full height of over six feet and left his parents’ campfire and walked straight into the creek calling out for the people to join him.

  She had said she was only a little girl, but when Holland put his hand on her back and lowered her face into the creek it was the first time in her life she felt loved. She had said it was the closest a human could come to touching God.

  The next day they found Reverend Elbuck’s wagon on the side of a road, mule chewing the bark of a persimmon, preacher slumped over the footrest. He had one hand on his Bible and the other on his heart. She said the Lord had taken Elbuck and given the world Holland.

  Holland founded his Church of the Pentecostals the next year, in a one-room building abandoned by a coal company. His mother said that God provided the building so that Holland could begin to save souls.

  She told them that sin was behind all the evils on the earth, the reason babies died and milk dried up in cows’ udders; the reason people lied and fornicated and stole. She said it was a sin to say idle words, to wear bright colors or look upon one’s reflection in a mirror. She dyed their clothes brown with walnuts because walnuts were free and brown was a respectable Christian color.

  Then there was Rolfe’s father who didn’t have so many rules, not for himself or for his children. He planted wobbly rows of sweet corn and took long walks through the mountains. He taught Rolfe how to hunt and fish and clean game without leaving waste. He played Hen and Chicks and Ring around the Rosy, made music from a tin whistle and fashioned dolls for Rolfe’s sister from burlap sacks and corn-silk hair. And he drank moonshine and sometimes got drunk with his friends.

  Rolfe heard the horseshoes clank as the preacher dropped them to the gr
ound. Holland stood stoop-shouldered at the far end of the parking lot, seemingly unsure of what to do next. Then he lifted his eyes to the hillside as if lost in thought.

  Rolfe slipped out of the trees, climbing the creek bed toward the family homestead. Thirty minutes later he dropped his packs by a water hole and stripped off his clothes. He scrubbed his body with gritty sediment until his skin was red and raw. Then he dressed and took a path to a ramshackle cabin in a clearing.

  The boards of the porch were stained black from walnuts his mother had left to dry in the sun. He remembered the cauldron of boiling clothes and his mother stirring them with a large wooden paddle. The cauldron was gone, replaced by empty jugs of his brother’s moonshine.

  He tossed his packs and rifle under the porch and climbed the steps toward the splintered door, pushed it open a few inches and looked inside.

  A haze of dust covered a plain wooden table. On the pine floor were grooves where his mother’s rocker had been. The furniture was all gone, the spinning wheel and loom – all no doubt sold for pennies at summer flea markets in the streets of Quills Landing by his good-for-nothing brother Clem.

  He remembered the cabin in every detail: the stain from an old blackberry pail, the windowsills hung with slices of dried pumpkin and sprigs of withered sage, yellow plum, lady slipper and mullion roots. He recalled how the door was left open on summer days, shafts of light across the floor, homemade crosses hanging from beams and shutters and walls.

  He could still see his mother dressed for church in a long dress buttoned to the neck, black bonnet and boots. He remembered the sunset’s disquieting transition from pink to purple. He remembered the terror of those night rides through the Hollow, the spindly black branches reaching down for them as their mother cracked a whip across the nag. He remembered how the people inside the church shouted and clapped and fell to their knees talking in strange tongue. He remembered how they feared both God and the Devil. And he remembered that oblong pine box next to the pulpit. The one with the red crosses painted on the sides.