by John Smolens
“How’d you get the key?” he asked.
“I live here. Adesso—now.”
“Where’s Gregor?”
Nikki sat next to him on the sofa. “Tonight you pay me.”
“Gregor wouldn’t like that.”
“Gregor is gone.”
“Where did he go?”
She shrugged.
He reached out and touched her forehead gently. “What happened here?”
She pulled her head back.
“Somebody hit you? Let me see.”
Her eyes were large, worried, and for a moment he thought she might cry—they were often angry, even fierce, but he had never seen them like this. He’d never seen her frightened. “You can pay me tonight?” she said, pleading.
“You’re going,” he said. “You’re hiding here and you’re going free.”
“Sì.” She leaned forward until her face was close to his, and her hands rested on his thigh. “I am not me for you. I am somebody else. Blond.”
“No, I’m here because of somebody else, but you are you.”
“What is her name?”
“I’m sorry I started this. Loomis was right.”
She shook her head. “Suo nome?”
“Hannah.”
“Haan-naah?”
“Yes, I’m sure it sounds funny to you.”
“What do you want? Anything I can do. Haan-naah love you.”
Sitting in his bedroom in Whitefish Harbor, Sean remembered mostly the way their breathing echoed off the soft stone walls in the cave. And how the mist of the sea came in on the night air. But she didn’t remind him of Hannah at all. She never had, not really. He kept wanting her to, but she didn’t. Strange: For the first time it was all right.
When he paid her, he asked, “Where do you go now? Home?”
“Home?”
“Albania? Hungary? Wherever you’re from.”
“No.” She counted the money. He had given her twice what he usually gave Gregor. She folded the bills, tucked them in the front pocket of her jeans, then leaned toward him and kissed his cheek. “Nord.”
“Where, north?”
“I must go. Meet Zoya.”
“The tall Russian girl? Loomis will be sorry. He liked her enough to go with her more than once.” Nikki didn’t seem to understand what he meant or it wasn’t important. She was looking toward the door of the cave. “I will go with you to meet Zoya,” he said.
After a moment she nodded. “Stazione.”
“Treno?”
“Sì.”
They climbed back to the top of the cliff, then walked down to catch the bus for the train station above the harbor. They didn’t speak, but Nikki held Sean’s hand. He didn’t know whether it was out of affection or fear. At the train station he got off with her. She put her hand on his chest as though to push him back, but he followed her through the station. She paused to read the schedule and then led him out to the platform and down through the tunnel that went under the tracks. They came upstairs at Binario 3: Bologna. There was a crowd waiting for the train, but no sign of Zoya.
Then it happened very fast. Sean looked up at the sign and saw the light flashing next to the word Bologna, which meant the train was about to arrive. Nikki said something he didn’t understand, and looking across the tracks, he saw Zoya and Loomis coming out of the station. She carried a small suitcase, and from a distance she looked quite elegant in a long gray raincoat. They were both walking fast. Then Sean saw two men, both in leather jackets, sprinting through the waiting room inside the station. When they pushed through the glass doors, Zoya and Loomis broke into a run and disappeared down the stairs to the tunnel.
The train’s headlight gleamed off the tracks as it approached, its horn blaring. Sean turned to Nikki, who was watching the men disappear down the stairs. Her eyes were glazed with tears and she was saying something in a language that was not Italian. Sean ran down the stairs back into the tunnel. As the train pulled in overhead, he heard shouts, a scream. At the bottom of the stairs he looked right and saw Loomis leaning with his back against the wall, and Zoya on her hands and knees, as though looking for something she had dropped. The two men were running back toward the stairs that led up to the station. As Sean ran down the tunnel, he saw Loomis kneel next to Zoya and try to hold her up, but she collapsed on the tiles, which Sean then realized were smeared with blood.
He was never sure exactly what they did then or how much time passed. The girl’s throat had been cut and Loomis was trying to shout above the noise of the train overhead. Finally, Sean went to the stairs to get help. He climbed up to the platform and saw the polizia coming out of the station—there were three of them, and the shortest one took him firmly by the upper arm, while the others went down into the tunnel. The policeman spoke so rapidly, Sean couldn’t understand a word. Sean kept saying “Non lo so” over and over. I don’t know, I don’t know. Then the train began to pull away from Binario 3, slowly at first. Sean watched the long line of cars pick up speed as they moved out into the darkness, and when the last car was gone, the platform was empty.
SEAN HEARD HIS father’s van pull out of the driveway. He stayed in his room, listening to his mother overhead. Every twenty minutes or so he heard her go through the same routine: open the freezer door, fill her glass with ice cubes, close the freezer door, pour bourbon over the ice, put the bottle back on the kitchen counter. After a couple of hours, she walked out the front door and slammed it behind her. Quickly, he got off his bed, drew back the curtain, and opened the sliding glass door. He jogged around the side of the garage and watched his mother back her car out of the driveway at an angle. She was trying to steer by looking in the rearview mirror. Her glass of bourbon sat on the dashboard. When the right rear tire bumped over the curb, the fender hit the split-rail fence that was draped with roses. There was the sound of splintering wood. The drink slid off the dashboard.
Sean went down the driveway and looked in through the open window. “Going somewhere?”
Ice lay in his mother’s lap. “What?”
“Why don’t you come back in the house where it’s cool?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“This,” she said. “You’re ruining us.”
“Ma, you’re hammered. And you just killed a bunch of roses it took you about ten years to grow. Every spring you look forward to seeing those roses bloom.”
“No, I’m not hammered. But my pants’re all wet.” She threw open the door and tried to get out of the car. He took her by the arm but she yanked it away. “You’re doing it, you know you are.” She was leaning so far forward it looked as though she might fall over. “I don’t know, maybe you think—I’ve never known what you think. I couldn’t understand you when you’re eight years old. I fed and clothed a lit-tle monster. Who are you?”
“You’ll never know,” he said. “You’ll never get it.”
“I don’t get you or your goddamn father.” She got to her feet, took an involuntary step sideways, and fell to the ground. “Damn it, help me get up!”
A mosquito flew into Sean’s ear and he slapped the side of his head hard. The buzzing stopped. “No,” he said. “I don’t think so.” He walked to his truck.
“You come back here.”
Sean got in behind the wheel and started the truck, then backed around her car and out the end of the driveway. He left rubber in the street.
12
HANNAH STOPPED AT Superior Gas & Lube. Sean’s pickup was parked beside the station. Arnie came out of the office and said, “He’s been staying at my place upstairs.” He leaned against the side of the Mercedes as the gas pump clicked along. “His dad chucked him out finally after that shit in the newspaper.”
“How’s he doing?” she asked.
Arnie played with the curved bill of his Red Wings cap for a moment. “Sleeps on the couch most nights, ’cept sometimes he wanders off, gets drunk, and I guess he sleeps on the beach. Some days
he’s got all these bug bites on his face and it looks pretty grim.”
The gas pump shut off; he topped up the tank and screwed the cap back on, then jammed the nozzle back on the pump. She handed him a twenty. As he made change, peeling bills off the wad he kept in his pocket, Hannah heard a door shut. She squinted up through the windshield and saw Sean come out on the small landing at the top of the apartment stairs. He was barefoot and didn’t have a shirt on, just a pair of faded jeans with a tear in one knee. Placing both hands on the railing, he stared down at the car. He looked so different it took her a moment to realize why: His head was shaved clean. It gleamed in the afternoon sun. “Jesus,” she whispered.
“Oh, yeah,” Arnie said, handing her several worn bills. “Did that the other day. I can rib him about it and he can’t pop me in the eye now ’cause he knows I’ll throw him out, and then he’ll be out of places to go.”
Sean watched them for a moment longer, then abruptly went back into the apartment. Hannah started the car and said, “Thanks, Arnie.” She started to pull away from the pumps but then turned and parked on the shady side of the garage. Getting out, she said, “Tell me, he alone up there?”
Arnie looked perplexed. “Sean’s alone everywhere.”
“I’m going to go up and talk to him.”
“Ooo-kay.” Arnie began walking back to the office door, scratching the back of his neck. “You don’t come out of there in five minutes, I’ll call in the militia.”
“Deal.”
Hannah climbed the wooden stairs up the side of the garage to the apartment. She rapped her knuckles on the door window. From inside, she heard footsteps, then the door, which stuck in the jamb due to the humidity, was pulled open. Sean stared out at her as though he had never seen her before. Without his hair, his face seemed beefy. No question he was his father’s son. That jaw was oiled with a sheen of sweat.
“Hi,” she said. “I thought maybe we could, you know, talk?”
“Talk?”
“Yes, Sean. Have a conversation?”
He gazed past her a moment. “What about?”
“Look, it’s hot out here in the sun. Mind if I come in?”
He hesitated, then said, “Sure.”
The door was low and she ducked her head as she entered a kitchenette. She’d never been up to Arnie’s apartment before; all the ceilings were slanted, which made it seem tight and small. There were dirty dishes stacked in the sink, empty beer bottles on the counter. Flies buzzed against the windows.
Sean went into the living room and sat down on the couch. A sleeping bag was spread out beneath him, and there were magazines and more plates and empty bottles covering the coffee table.
Hannah’s legs were shaking slightly and she wanted to sit down. There was a chair across the room, but she decided against it. “Listen, Sean, I just think we might try and clear the air.”
“What’s wrong with the air?” Without his shirt on she could see his shoulders and arms were still muscular but he’d put on at least ten pounds around his middle. He had bug bites on his face and scalp, and some looked as if they’d been gouged with fingernails until they’d bled.
Hannah waited. It wasn’t easy. It was stifling in the apartment—worse than out in the afternoon sun—and the only sound was the buzzing of flies. Finally he raised his eyes, and she said, “There just doesn’t seem to be any point in going on like this, is all. What happened can’t be changed. I don’t want to go on feeling this way every time I see you. You know?”
Something gave in his eyes. He seemed to have made some kind of decision. His whole head, she realized, was beaded with sweat. “I suppose you’re right.”
She went over to the chair and sat down. It was so hot it was difficult to breathe. “Do you suppose I could have a glass of water or something?”
He got up from the couch and went to the refrigerator in the kitchenette. “I guess I know what you mean. When you think about it, it’s really dumb. We both are going to live here, we’re both going to see each other. It only makes sense we get along.” He took out a bottle of water, opened it, and brought it to her. Instead of going back to the couch, he sat on the edge of the coffee table and leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. One hand played idly with the tear in the denim.
Hannah took a long drink of cold water. “I’m sorry you’re having this trouble with the police, and this court thing, and all that stuff in the newspaper—and now I guess your folks, too.”
“It’ll work out.”
“I know it will.” She took another drink and suddenly felt a bit light-headed. “It’s really hot up here. I don’t know how you can . . .” She drank more water.
“I know. Arnie’s being really good about letting me crash here. Tell you the truth, I’ve been thinking about taking off, getting out of the U.P. entirely.” He sounded almost hopeful and he never took his eyes off of her.
She didn’t want to sound pleased, but she couldn’t help saying, “You know, the summer people don’t understand.” He smiled. “They think Whitefish Harbor is always a sunny day in July. They don’t see the long gray winters. It might be good to get away from it.” She filled her mouth with water and swallowed with difficulty. “Where would you go?”
“Oh, I’m working on a few things, talking to some people, you know, down around Detroit. Or Chicago. Or maybe over to Minneapolis.”
“You won’t become a Twins fan?”
“’Course not.”
“God, this heat,” she said. “Will you promise me something?”
“Sure.”
“You’ll let me know. You won’t just disappear.”
“No. I’ll call or something.”
She realized her hands were shaking and she was having a hard time holding the bottle. Her back was chilled. There were goose bumps on her arms and it was as though something icy were sliding beneath her skin. “I think . . .”
“You need to get out of this heat up here,” he said, standing.
Hannah heard the plastic bottle hit the floor. She wasn’t sure, but after that she might have fainted or blacked out for just a few moments, because suddenly she was walking down the outside stairs. The sun was so hot it seemed her hair would catch fire. She realized that Sean was holding her by the elbow and Arnie was standing at the bottom of the stairs.
“I’m all right,” Hannah said. “I just had to get out of that heat.”
“I could drive you,” Arnie said.
“No, really—thanks. I’m feeling better already. I’ll be fine once I get home.” She stood up straighter and walked to the Mercedes. Arnie was at her side, one hand on her elbow, an oddly formal gesture. Before she got in the car, she looked back toward Sean. He gazed at her a moment, then climbed the stairs to the apartment.
WHEN HE REACHED the landing, it hit Sean: Hannah had said “home” differently. “Home” was no longer her mother’s house, but that old place Martin Reed had bought. Hannah was now living there with him.
HANNAH OPENED HER EYES. Martin was sitting on the edge of their bed. She had slept for what seemed like days. She had no idea what time it was, only that it was dark outside. Martin had made hard-boiled eggs, which he’d peeled and chilled in a bowl of ice. Gracie was curled up asleep at the foot of the bed.
“He shaved his head clean,” Hannah said. “On him it looks so . . . I don’t know.” She sat up and took one of the eggs from the bowl. “He’s also put on weight, so he looks even more like his father.” She began eating the egg. It had been awhile since something tasted so good to her.
“What do you think’s happening with him? He’s been thrown out of his parents’ house. He’s out of work. He’s facing some kind of legal trouble that won’t go away. . . .”
Hannah finished the first egg and took another from the bowl. “This afternoon, for a moment, I thought he and I were, you know, talking, getting through, and I said I wanted to make peace with him so in the future there wouldn’t be all this . . . this weight whenever I saw him. I see
him and it’s like the air gets heavy all of a sudden. Maybe he wants to put it all behind him now, too. I don’t know.”
“Shaving his head, though. I know it’s funny coming from me, but it sounds odd.”
Reaching up, Hannah ran her fingers over Martin’s skull, which had the slightest stubble. “It feels almost like fuzz,” she said. “I like it. The first thing I noticed about you when we met here that day was this gleam, the way the light reflected off your head.” She held the egg toward the lamp on the nightstand. “See?”
“Actually, it’s time I shaved it.”
“You know, I’ve never seen you shave your head.” She took a bite out of the egg. “Can I?”
“Watch?”
“No, I want to do it.”
“Now?”
She put the rest of the egg in her mouth and threw back the bedsheet.
They got his shaving kit and went into the kitchen. She told him to sit on a chair next to the sink. She shook the aerosol can and sprayed a large mound of cream into her hand, which she carefully spread over his skull. She put a new blade in his razor, and when she was about to begin she hesitated. “I don’t want to cut you.”
“Just go slow.”
She positioned herself so that she was straddling his left leg, and her first pass over that side of his head was tentative. She rinsed the blade clean in the sink and made a second pass. The razor glided through the cream, rising and falling with the contours of his skull. When she had one side of his head done, she began to do the other side, working her way down to where she edged around the ears. Throughout it all, he held perfectly still.
“Are you enjoying this as much as I am?” she asked.
“I am. No one has ever done this before.”
When she finished, she soaked a towel with warm water and washed off the remaining shaving cream. His head shone in the light; she ran her fingers over it, then leaned over and kissed his skin. At first he held perfectly still, but then he moved his head slowly so that her mouth and tongue glided over his skull. She wanted to kiss every part of it, and she took the back of his neck in her hands. He untied the sash and opened her bathrobe. His hand lifted her breast to his mouth, while the other hand slid between her legs. Her mouth and tongue moved over his skull, coating the skin with a thin membrane of saliva.
