3
“It’s extra for two,” the old guy at the front desk told me when he saw Alicia and the suitcase.
“How much
extra
?” Alicia asked him, her voice hard.
“Uh, twenty-five a week.”
She handed him the money without asking me.
We went upstairs to my room.
Alicia put her shoeboxes down. I put her suitcase on the floor.
“There’s only one—”
“That’s okay,” she said. “I want you to sit there anyway.”
“How come?”
“So you can see.”
I sat in the chair. Alicia used the little scissors and cut the string. Then she gave me one of the shoeboxes. “Look,” she told me.
Inside were envelopes. A whole long stack of envelopes. Every one with my name on it. And the prison address. But no stamps.
“I wrote to you,” she said. “Every day. I told you what I was doing. Every day. Now you can read them. You can see for yourself.”
“How many of these—?”
“Two thousand, nine hundred, and forty-one,” she said. “I didn’t get to write you today yet—I always do that after I get off from work.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“In the last box, there’s a little more than thirteen thousand dollars. I saved some, every week.”
“Jesus.”
“You never got your meal. At the Greek’s, I mean. I’ll go out and get some food,” she said. “You can start reading the letters.”
“But there’s—”
“After you read them, every one, then you decide.”
“Decide what?” I asked her.
“Decide if you really were my boyfriend.
Been
my boyfriend all these years. If I waited for you, faithful. If I loved you.”
“Alicia . . .”
“If you decide you were, that I waited all this time, we can go together, get an apartment. I’m not too young now. If you don’t, the money’s yours. I saved it for you. So you could start over.”
“How could you—”
“Me, I was never pretending,” she said. “And there’s the proof.”
for Emily Lyon Segan
REACHING BACK
1
“I want to see her,” the woman said.
“Lots of people want to see her,” the man replied. “Lots of people want lots of things. It ain’t that simple.”
“Stop playing me like
I’m
simple, okay?” the woman retorted. “It took me a long time to find you. A lot of money, too. Just tell me what the ticket costs and let me get on the train.”
The man was not so much fat as blobby, flesh oozing from his clothes as though it might flow like lava at any moment. His eyes were buried in pockets of obscene obesity, but their glint wasn’t piggish; it was reptilian. He was plopped in a huge armchair, a clipboard held on the puddle of flesh that should have been his lap.
He regarded the woman standing before him with the icy objectivity of a slave trader. She looked somewhere in her twenties, a little less than medium height, ash-blond hair pulled back and held in place with a thick black elastic band. Impossible to tell the shape of her body under the loose-fitting Army field jacket she wore. Her posture was straight, turquoise eyes unblinking. Her face was clear of makeup, her mouth a straight line.
“Take off that coat,” the fat man ordered.
The woman did as she was told. She was wearing a black T-shirt and khaki pants, a thick leather belt around her waist.
“Come on, come on,” the fat man said impatiently. “You could be wearing a wire, all I know.”
The woman slipped the T-shirt over her head in one smooth motion, so quickly she seemed to maintain eye contact throughout. She unhooked the belt and the waistband of the khaki pants blossomed so widely she was able to simply step out of them. A black jersey bra and a pair of modest white briefs were revealed to the fat man’s eye.
“Okay, now turn around,” he said.
The woman did one slow turn. Her calf muscles were sharply defined, the thighs thick with corded muscle. Her upper body was softer in appearance, breasts straining against the soft container. She completed the turn as smoothly as she had removed the T-shirt, maintaining the impression that her eyes never left the fat man even while her back was toward him.
The fat man licked where his lips should have been, eyes flitting over the woman’s body like a spider’s legs climbing a wall. “You ready to pay what it costs?” he asked her.
“Yes,” is all she said.
“Then get over here.”
The woman walked over to the fat man. Kept coming until she was only inches away.
“Get on your knees,” the fat man said.
The woman dropped to her knees so quickly and soundlessly the fat man wasn’t sure he saw the movement.
“You ready to get to work?” he asked.
“I want to see her,” the woman said.
“All right, bitch. You’re gonna get what you want. But first, I get what
I
want, understand?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, now take my—” The fat man hesitated as though he’d been interrupted, although the woman knelt in silence, looking only at the fat man’s third eye.
“You . . .” the fat man began. And again stopped speaking.
The woman’s gaze remained locked to the same point, right between the fat man’s eyes. She didn’t speak.
The fat man broke into a heavy sweat, his stench suffusing the narrow basement room.
The woman didn’t move.
“Ah, forget it,” the fat man said, his voice brittle around the edges. “You wouldn’t be any good anyway. Ten grand, that’s the price. You got it?”
“Yes,” the woman said, not moving.
“You got it
with
you?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“In my jacket.”
“Show me.”
The woman got to her feet. She bent at the waist and reached into the side pocket of the field jacket. When she straightened up, her left hand was clenched into a fist. She walked the few steps over to the fat man’s armchair. When she opened her fist, gold glistened in the dim light.
“Krugerrands,” the woman said. “Thirty-five of them. They’re worth around three hundred apiece.”
“Worth to
who,
bitch?” the fat man sneered, back on safe ground. “They were trading at two seventy-nine and change this morning. You’re about three yards short.”
The woman opened her right hand. Two more gold coins were on her palm. “Keep the change,” she said.
2
The woman climbed the steps up from the basement and entered an alley. The sun was dropping. At the mouth of the alley, two white males were sitting on garbage cans. One was playing with a stiletto, idly testing the point against his palm. The other held a length of bicycle chain, swinging it like a pendulum from one end.
“You got any money, honey?” the knifeman asked softly as the woman approached.
The woman kept walking as though she hadn’t heard.
“Man asked you a
question,
whore!” the one with the bicycle chain spat out, getting to his feet.
The woman produced a blue steel semi-automatic pistol and pointed it at his belly. Her face was as calm as her hand was steady. The man backed up until he felt the garbage can behind him. Then he sat down.
The woman walked out of the alley.
3
The crone looked old enough to be Cain’s sister. And evil enough to have taught him his tricks. She was seated behind a block of stone that looked as though it were an extension of the cellar walls, a dark, moist slab.
“You went to a great deal of trouble to find me,” she said to the blonde woman.
The woman didn’t answer.
“You want to reach back, yes?” the crone asked. “Bring someone up through the gate?”
“Yes.”
“If you came to me, you must know how it works. The only ones who can come back are those who did great harm. You do understand that, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And you have to bring me what they took. You understand that as well?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me the name,” the crone said.
“Bobby. Bobby Wayne Foster.”
“Close your eyes,” the crone commanded.
The blonde did as she was told. She heard sounds she couldn’t identify: a metallic liquid crackling; a high-pitched, almost inaudible whine; something like a captive bird’s fluttering feathers.
Time passed.
“He took seven,” the crone finally said. “A serial killer. Rapist and murderer both.”
The blonde opened her eyes. “I know,” she said.
“You have found the Gatekeeper,” the crone said, “not the gate. He took seven, and he was finally taken himself. We have him. If you want to reach back for him, you must take another seven. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“You understand it all? If you yourself are taken while you are harvesting for us, then—”
“I know,” the blonde said.
“Yes, you know,” the crone replied. “But we know
all.
We know where you came from. And war does not count. You must take as he took.”
“The same . . . ?”
“No. It does not have to be the same way. But you must kill
to
kill—that is the only purpose permitted. The killings must not be sanctioned. Do not waste our time as others have. If you found work as an executioner, killing those on Death Row in some prison, it would not count. If you kill to defend yourself, it would not count. If you are a police officer and you kill a felon, it would not count.”
“I agree.”
“Ah, ‘agree,’ you say. You understand this is a contract, then?”
“Yes.”
“Seven
separate
killings.”
“Yes. How will you know if—?”
“We will know,” the crone said. “Do not attempt to return here. This place will no longer exist after you leave. If you succeed, you will be returned to me.”
4
“I told them,” the little girl said. “I told them all, just like the lady said to. But they didn’t believe me.”
“Some of them believed you,” the blonde woman said. “The jury was deadlocked—some of them must have voted for a conviction.”
“Yes, the vote was ten to two,” the little girl’s mother said, bitter-voiced. “But it almost killed Lila, that terrible ordeal. And I’m not going to put her through it again.”
“How long were you married?” the blonde asked.
“Less than two years,” the mother said. “Lila isn’t his child. I thought she needed a father. He had such a good job, his own business and all. He’s a plumber. I thought he could give her a better life. I realize now what I did. To her.”
“Don’t cry, Momma,” the little girl said.
5
“Where’s the guy who called me?” the plumber asked.
“He had to go out,” the blonde said. “He told me to show you where the leak is.”
“I can find it myself. Just tell me—”
“No. I mean, it’s not here. It’s in one of the outbuildings. About a half-mile from here. Can we go in your truck?”
“Sure,” he said, eyeing the woman appreciatively.
A ten-minute drive brought the two of them to what looked like an abandoned shack standing just outside a copse of trees. The plumber turned to the blonde woman: “What the hell is
that
? Looks like nobody’s been here for years.”
“That’s right,” the blonde woman said, showing him the pistol, now fitted with a tube silencer.
6
“I did my time,” the pudgy woman said. “They took my kid away from me, too.” Her facial expression was flat, her skin so taut and shiny it looked glazed. “How come you’re nosing around with all these questions now?”
“Just routine, ma’am,” the blonde woman said.
“Yeah, well, the hell with your routine. I’m not even on parole anymore. I know my rights. I’m calling my lawyer.” She turned and picked up the telephone.
The bullet caught the pudgy woman precisely at the base of her skull. She fell to the floor, the telephone still in her hand.
7
“You don’t look like no major player to me,” the black man said. “You said
weight,
okay? That’s keys, not ounces. You want to deal, you got to show me something.”
“I’ve got it,” the blonde woman said.
“Where? I don’t see nothing yet. Just a lot of talk.”
“It’s right here,” the blonde said, taking out her pistol.
8
“You’ll like it, honey,” the dark-haired woman said. “There’s a big market for these bondage flicks. Four, maybe five hours’ work for five thousand bucks. In cash. Where’re you gonna get a deal like that?”
“I don’t know. . . .” The blonde woman hesitated.
“Oh,
forget
what you heard, all right? Lymon had nothing to do with what happened to that girl they found. The scene is full of sickos, I’ll give you that. But this is strictly legit—well, except for the IRS, of course.” She laughed. “Come on, what do you say?”
“Where is the studio?”
“Oh, it’s just outside of town. In this warehouse Lymon has all fixed up. I can take you out there myself.”
“No, that’s okay. Just give me the address.”
“I can’t do that, honey. That’s not the way it works. What do you say, want to give it a try?”
“No,” the blonde woman said, pulling the pistol from her purse.
9
“You some kinda social worker?” the heavily muscled Latino asked.
“That’s right,” the blonde woman said.
“Yeah, well, you wanna hear me go through the whole damn thing again? She made it up—most of it, anyway. Yeah, sure, I gave her a slap or two. The mouth on her—what was I supposed to do?”
“You didn’t have to beat her up.”
“Beat her up? I just slapped her, I told you. That hospital, they was just looking for business, you know what I mean? The Welfare pays them extra when somebody’s gotta stay overnight.”
“Her cheekbone was broken.”
“Yeah, that’s what they said. It’s not like I shot her or nothing, right?”
“Right,” the blonde woman said.
10
“How old is your daughter?” the slender, well-dressed man asked.
“Four,” the blonde woman said.
“And you’re sure she’s never been . . . ?”
“Nobody’s ever touched her,” the blonde said.
“This is a release,” the slender man said. “For photographs and video. If you ever go to the law, you’ll be in it as deep as we are, understand what I’m saying?”
“Yes. You have the money?”
“Of course. But first we have to see the goods. Not just a picture. When you bring what we agreed on, you’ll be paid on the spot.”
The blonde put three bullets into the slender man’s midsection. Then she knelt and fired another slug just behind his ear. She was getting to her feet as a woman entered the room, a camcorder in her hand. She dropped the camcorder and raised her hand to her mouth in a gesture of shock. The blonde raised the pistol.
11
The last was a middle-aged Eurasian woman. As she stepped out of her house toward the garage, the last thing she saw was the blonde before the bullet entered her right eye. She was dead before she hit the ground.
12
“Seven, as promised,” the crone said. “You took nine, but only seven counted.”
“I know,” the blonde woman answered. “Now bring him back.”
“You did it very quickly. Where did you learn such skills?”
“In the Army.”
“When we reach back, he can return at any age, as I told you. He was twenty-three when he was taken. That was almost four years ago. The aging process continues even . . . there. How old do you want him to be when he passes through the gate?”
“I want him to be a baby. A newborn baby.”
“Yes. Ever since this started, thousands of years ago, people like you have been called vigilantes. But it’s not for justice, is it? It’s always for revenge. What did he do that you want to kill him as a baby? Are you related to one of the victims?”
“Not one of the victims,” the blonde said. “Him. He’s my brother. We were separated when I was five and he was only a year old. They put us in different homes. I didn’t even know he existed until . . . it was in the papers. My parents, the ones who adopted me, they never told me.”
“And you want to reach back for him, have him pass back through the gate as a baby, so you can kill him yourself? For what he did to your name?”
“No,” the blonde said. “I want to
raise
him myself. So he can honor it.”
for David Hechler