Her face softened. She pushed a lock of hair from her forehead. Opened the door and scrambled into the front seat. “Thank you. I was getting claustrophobic back there.” Touching his arm lightly, she said, “I’ll be quiet.”
“Just be yourself,” he said. “And I’ll try, too. Be patient with me. I’ve been locked up for three years. I get tense once in a while. I’m still trying to get back to normal.” He bestowed upon her his best smile, not faking it, wanting her to trust him, to take away her doubts.
“Okay,” she said, the brightness back in her eyes again, and he marveled at the power he had to affect her, like pushing buttons to make her happy or sad. Or afraid.
He pushed another button, touching her hand where it rested on her knee.
“It’s nice having you with me,” he said. And found that the words came easy to him.
His touch is like those small shocks of electricity you get when you walk on a thick carpet.
He draws his hand quickly away but his touch remains like an afterburn on my skin.
His smile is dazzling but more than that. There’s affection in it. Mr. Sinclair once said that affection is one of the most neglected words in the English language, that people throw the word love around like confetti when they mean affection. And that affection is a special feeling that you can have for a person.
But I think affection is also sad, especially when a person wants more than affection, wants love and can’t have it.
“Eric.” I love saying his name.
“What?” he asks, absently as usual, as if he is thinking of other things and has not actually heard me.
“I think my fixation is gone.”
“Good.” He turns slightly toward me, a half smile on his lips. Then back to the highway again.
“I think I’m falling in love with you instead.”
He does not answer. The car shoots forward, picking up speed.
“That’s not a smart thing to do,” he says, finally, speaking slowly, as if he has rehearsed the words in his mind. “How do you know what love is, anyway? You’re just a kid.…”
I move my body but I feel cheap doing it because my body doesn’t excite him. Or at least he pretends it doesn’t.
“I’m almost sixteen,” I reply. “And love’s got nothing to do with age. Romeo and Juliet. Juliet was fourteen. I never felt this way before. Well, maybe a little.” Thinking of Mr. Sinclair.
“With who?” he asks, but as if he’s humoring me, making conversation.
“A teacher, Mr. Sinclair.”
“Did he know you had this feeling for him?”
“Maybe, because he was afraid of me.”
“Why was he afraid of you?”
“Afraid he might get into trouble if he touched me, showed me how he felt.”
He doesn’t reply but keeps his eyes on the highway, still glancing in the rearview mirror once in a while.
We cruise along, the windows open, wind blowing my hair, talking once in a while, and even the silences are nice. I place my hand on his knee, and he allows it to remain there.
Turning off the highway, we drive through country roads, dappled with sunlight, gentle breezes coming into the car now and not stiff winds.
We drive into the center of a town whose name I don’t know and it doesn’t matter. As we slowly pass a bus terminal, I feel him stiffen beside me, actually feel him going rigid, his knuckles on the steering wheel turning white. He swivels into a parking space and is staring out my side window.
I follow his gaze and see her. She is tall, with long black hair flowing down her back, almost to her waist. She’s wearing a long brown paisley skirt and a white blouse. Her head is tilted as she looks in the window of a clothing store. The look in his eyes startles me, shocks me, in fact. Like glancing into his soul, something raw and naked there, such longing in his eyes but even more than longing. Like a hunger. I think of those horror movies I’ve seen, where a man turns into a werewolf in front of your eyes, camera tricks, changing from a regular person to an animal, hairy, with claws, glittering eyes. Eric doesn’t turn into an animal, not hairy and no claws, but he has changed. The naked need in his eyes makes me shiver in the heat.
I take a deep breath.
“Why don’t you go and speak to her?” I hear myself saying.
He glances at me as if he had forgotten I am here.
“She’s beautiful,” I say. “She’s all by herself, alone. Maybe she’s lonesome.”
I hate myself for telling him this but I want him to be happy.
He shakes his head, more than once, twice, three times, as if he’s trying to shake off not only my words but something inside of him.
“Go ahead,” I urge. “Talk to her. It’s like she’s waiting for you.”
While I’m talking to him, I’m playing a trick with my mind, knowing what he might do if he goes to the girl, but not allowing myself to acknowledge what he might do, as if my mind is splitting in two, half in the light and half in shadows. I know what that need in his eyes means, what he might have done to those other girls, but I also deny it at the same time: he’s only a regular guy who’s seen a good-looking girl on the street and wants to pick her up.
“I love you,” I say. “I want you to be happy. Go to her.”
He has one hand on the door handle and I think he is about to launch himself from the van when I say, “Wait.”
As we both look at her, the girl turns away from the store window, eyes bright with anticipation as a guy with a briefcase arrives wearing a beige summer suit. She greets him with a big smile as he bends to touch his lips briefly to her cheek.
Eric guns the engine, his foot slamming the accelerator, the smell of exhaust enveloping the van.
“Let’s go,” he says, his voice harsh and bitter.
And we go.
How much does she know? he wondered as they headed toward the highway again, silence in the car, the girl looking out of her window.
They hadn’t spoken since they left the town behind. He didn’t know what to say to her. Afraid of what he might say. She had urged him to pick up the girl. He’d heard the urgency in her voice, like she was cheering him on. As if she knew what he was going to do and didn’t care. She said she loved him—does love go that far?
Actually, he was relieved now that the guy with the briefcase had come along, taking away any decision he might have had to make. The situation had been filled with danger. Broad daylight and a strange town. The girl in the van practically a witness. Yet the need inside him had been so intense that he might have capitulated, might have made a disastrous error.
“I could use a shower,” the girl said, breaking the silence at last. “I feel all grimy.…”
Her face was innocent of deceit as he glanced at her.
His thoughts raced ahead. Seized a solution, a course of action. “We can stay at a motel tonight. You can shower all you want.” Then added, “Don’t worry—twin beds. Then we can find a nice restaurant.” He thought grimly: like a prisoner’s last meal. Then, sometime in the night, a quiet goodbye. Maybe with a pillow, quick and silent.
“Know what I feel like having?” she said, all eagerness. “A real turkey dinner, just like Thanksgiving.…”
“Too hot,” he said. “I thought girls like salads, stuff like that.…”
He was enjoying this stupid conversation about what to eat.
“That girl back there. She was so beautiful,” she said. “Dressed nice. Did you notice her outfit? I’d love to have clothes like that someday.…” Wistful, kind of sad.
“Why someday?” he asked. “Why not today?”
He felt reckless with generosity, knowing that he held this girl’s life in his hands, had the power to make her happy or sad.
For the moment, why not make her happy?
“We’ll find a good store in the next town,” he said. “We’ll go on a shopping spree.”
Everything in the store was black and white, from the stripes on the walls to the swirl of ti
les on the floor.
The woman who came forward from the back of the store was attired entirely in black, which drew Eric’s eyes to the white streak in her hair.
“A dress,” the girl told her, her voice wispy and small.
The woman sized up the girl with eyes as impersonal as an X-ray technician’s. The girl glanced beseechingly at Eric: help me, her eyes pleaded.
Eric waved his hand extravagantly. “Get more than a dress,” he said. “Some sporty things, blouses …”
“Tops,” the clerk said, correcting him, taking him in at a glance, then dismissing him completely.
As the girl leafed through a rack of dresses, he was struck by the irony of the situation. She would never have the opportunity to wear the clothes to a dance or on a date. The purchases would be a waste of money, in fact. Yet he enjoyed the prospect of spending money on her.
The girl disappeared into a dressing room, two or three dresses over her arm, glancing back at him with a delighted smile. The clerk went to the window and looked out, ignoring him, glancing at her watch occasionally.
The girl flounced out of the dressing room, radiating bliss, the dress a dazzle of bright red-and-yellow flowers. Face flushed, eyes brilliant, she asked, “What do you think?”
He knew that it did not matter what he thought. It was obvious that she loved this garish dress she’d never wear.
“Beautiful,” he said. It did not cost him anything to say it. He displayed his old smile, charm and shyness, that always worked.
She also bought other stuff—two or three tops, a short beige skirt—too short, he thought, amazed at how her taste ran counter to his.
He saw a big white hat on the head of a faceless mannequin, reminiscent of the hat that girl had worn in the canoe. He took it off the mannequin and brought it to the girl in both hands, like an offering.
“Oh, Eric,” she cried happily.
While the clerk stood by, looking at the floor or ceiling but never at them.
As Eric peeled off twenty-dollar bills to pay for the purchases, the clerk drew away in surprise. “Cash?” As if pronouncing a foreign word.
“Keep the change,” Eric said, knowing how stupid that sounded despite the contempt in his voice.
The clerk, finally, raised her eyes to his.
Eric smiled at her, a smile of promise and menace, and saw her flinch. Let her take that to bed with her tonight, he thought, as he left the store with the girl.
Outside, she said, “I should have freshened up before going in there. I feel all icky.…”
“You’re fine,” he said.
They bought a dryer in a drugstore in response to her remark that her hair would be a mess after a shower without a dryer.
“Why not some perfume?” he suggested as they walked by a counter displaying pyramids of fancy boxes, some blue, some green, the scent of flowers in the air.
“I like the smell of soap,” the girl said. “And anyway you should save your money.”
She touched his arm, somehow an intimate gesture, as if they were a couple going steady, putting aside money for an engagement ring. Like so many stupid movies he’d seen.
At the motel she dumped the boxes and plastic bags on the twin bed she’d chosen and sighed, blowing air out of the corner of her mouth.
“Shower time,” she announced. “Then I’ll put on a style show for you.…”
He stared at the blank television screen, waiting for her, listening to the sound of water jetting from the shower head, hearing her voice above it all—was she singing? He remembered sitting like this in the facility for hours at a time, trying to keep his mind as blank as the featureless tube before him. Then he filled the blank with Maria Valdez, dusky and dark, imagining what she would look like taking a shower, water streaming down her sleek body, her black hair clustered on her flesh.
“Don’t look,” the girl commanded, invading the room, filling the air with the clean, brisk smell of pine.
Listening to the rustle of clothing as she dressed, he was amazed at the series of events that had brought him here to this room, so different from what he imagined his first day of real freedom would be like.
“Okay,” she said. “You can turn around now.…”
She was wearing a dress she had not shown him at the store, white, shimmering with sequins, a sparkling senior prom kind of dress that reached her ankles. Her blond hair sparkled, too, loose and full, cascading to her shoulders. She was barefoot, which made her seem too young for the dress, like a little girl trying on her mother’s clothes. Except for the fullness of her breasts.
She twirled in front of him, imitating actresses she’d probably seen in movies, hair whirling, too, and her eyes as radiant as the sequins in the dress.
Stopping suddenly, she declared, “I love you, Eric. Not because you bought me all this stuff but because …”
He raised his finger to his lips.
“Shhh,” he said.
Later, at a restaurant across from the motel, she confessed, “I knew that you didn’t like that flowered dress. That’s why I chose the white one.”
He marveled at how she had read his thoughts, had seen behind the expression on his face, unconvinced by the Eric Poole charm. Another reason to eliminate her.
For dessert she ordered chocolate cake topped with whipped cream but pushed it away half eaten. Sagging with weariness, she said, “I’m pooped. It’s been a long day.…”
He agreed, signaling the waitress for the check.
“But it turned out to be a good day, didn’t it, Eric?” Looking to him for confirmation.
“Yes,” he said.
That was not the moment to speak the truth.
He lay in bed, waiting for her to go to sleep. He didn’t have to wait long. Like a child, she’d curled up in the sheet, yawning, murmuring, “Night, Eric,” then, hand tucked under her chin, she drifted off, small snoring sounds coming from her after a while.
He snapped off the lamp beside his bed and let his eyes become accustomed to the darkness. The events of the day caught up to him, images flashing in his mind. The van, the highway, the park, and, most of all, the girl entering his life, changing his plans, forcing him to do the unexpected. Yet he was grateful to her, in a way. She had introduced him to the world of people, preparing him for social situations, conversations, sauntering in a park. He was glad that he had bought the new clothes, insisted on the chocolate cake for dessert. Little enough to pay her back.
The girl stirred and he squinted at her through the half darkness. Bands of light sifting through the venetian blinds laddered her body. Her snores were deep, vibrating. The snoring stopped and she murmured in her sleep, words he could not understand. The digital clock read 1:07. Which surprised him. He must have dozed off without being aware of it.
He reviewed his plan, assessing the risks. There were always risks, of course, and he had learned to accept them as his way of life. The biggest risk would be carrying her body to the van, although he had tried to minimize it. He had insisted on a room at the far end of the motel. Had backed the van up to the door of the room. He’d left the van unlocked for easy entry. It would take less than a minute to carry her body the few feet to the van and place her inside. Earlier tonight, he had loosened the outside bulb in the lighting fixture next to the door. He would dispose of the body later in the usual way.
Finally, he sat up in bed and groped for the pillow. His bare feet touched the floor, the carpet soft, his movements noiseless. He then stood still, counting slowly to fifty, listening to the rhythm of her breathing. She had thrown off her sheet. Her T-shirt had bunched up above her stomach, revealing flesh as pale as the moon, the indentation of her navel. He moved, his shadow falling across her body, obliterating her momentarily.
He held the pillow in front of him like a shield. He had done his mother this way. Seemed like the kindest way to do it—you did not see the face during the struggle. And the struggle was feeble and brief.
Next to the bed now, hoverin
g over her, he gathered himself, his legs spread apart to provide leverage, her body bathed in pale light.
As he raised the pillow, her eyes flew open and she looked directly up at him.
Then: her eyes wide with fear, her mouth open as if she was silently screaming.
They stared at each other—he didn’t know how long.
Her face suddenly softened.
“Don’t you know I love you?” she said, as if that would stop him, could solve everything.
Closing her eyes, she sighed. “Go ahead, then. Do it.”
He lowered the pillow, stood uncertainly beside her bed. Outside, a car ghosted past the motel, its sound dying in the distance.
He let the pillow drop to the floor.
Half sitting up, leaning on one elbow, she looked up at him.
“Were you really going to do it?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said.
But in my heart, where it counts the most, I know he wouldn’t have done it. For a moment, yes, I was terrified, without even seeing the pillow, only saw his face, pale and cold, like the face on a coin. But the pillow brought the terror, and I wonder now if I screamed. I don’t think so, because he just stood there and dropped the pillow, and now I know that I’m safe. If he didn’t do it here in a quiet motel away from everybody, when would he do it? Never, I tell myself while he’s still standing there, looking down at me.
I want to hear his voice, want to hear him talk.
“You didn’t do it,” I say. “Because you couldn’t.”
He still doesn’t say anything.
“Could you?”
The calmness of my voice surprises me because I am shaking inside, my stomach churning and my heart clumping against my ribs.
A frown scrawls itself across his forehead, like scribbles on white paper.
“No,” he says, finally. “I couldn’t.”
“That’s because I love you, and you know it. I’m not like the other girls.…” Thinking of that girl near the railroad tracks and the girls that reporter had mentioned.
His frown deepens and I wonder if I’ve gone too far, but I figure I have nothing to lose. And I can’t seem to stop talking, as if my fear has given me a shot of energy. The fear is gone but my blood is sizzling in my veins, like needle points stinging me from the inside.