Encouraged, she said, “I saw the doctor today. My six-week checkup, remember? I’m all back to normal.”
She waited for him to respond. She wondered if he had even heard her.
“You’ll find out,” she said, “if we can pry those kids away from the television and get them to bed.”
But later, when the television was off and the house silent, and she slipped into bed beside him, he lay with his back to her. She reached out and touched him, running her fingers along his side, under the arm. She could almost feel him shrink away from her.
The room was hot and close, except for a breeze from the electric fan on the dresser.
“Carl?”
“Mm?” he grunted.
“I’m here.”
“Go to sleep.”
She propped herself on her elbow. “What’s the matter? It’s been almost a year.”
He half turned his head. “Sshh, do you want the kids to wake up?” “They can’t hear, the doors are all closed. And anyway, they must know. They know where Adam came from.”
His head returned to the pillow. She waited for some response. He ignored her.
She reached out again. “Carl, what’s wrong?”
Again he seemed to shrivel under her touch. She pulled back her hand. It was as though she repelled him.
Perhaps … those evenings coming home with Toni Lemich … Maybe there was something there.
“Listen,” she whispered, “aren’t you ever going to—I mean—”
“Not now. Just not now. Go to sleep.”
He was unnatural. Larry had always wanted her, even when she knew he had others. She began to feel ashamed of herself, pleading like this.
For a while she lay in the dark, with tears just behind her eyes. It wasn’t that she was horny. It was the closeness she wanted, the love between the two of them. They had created a baby together. They had a family, a home. There should have been love.
She moved closer to him, so that her voice would fall into his ear, even though he might be drifting off to sleep. But he wasn’t. She could still feel the tension.
“Carl—honey—is something wrong? Just tell me. Something you might be afraid of, or worried about?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I just want you to know that you can be free with me. I know some men worry if they think, you know, they’re not going to make it. They think the woman’s going to laugh at them, or get angry. They don’t want to try.”
Perhaps he was influenced by that newspaper article, about the killer who might have a problem with impotence. Surely Carl would not identify with that. But it might play into a fundamental fear.
He said, “That’s too ridiculous for words.”
Was it really another woman? She hadn’t taken the idea seriously before.
“Is there somebody else?” she asked, and was amazed at how calmly she managed it.
“Joyce, go to sleep.”
Not “darling” this time, nor “sweetheart.” Just Joyce.
“You’re in love with somebody else, aren’t you?”
“I’m not in love with anybody,” he told her angrily.
She nodded sadly to herself, thinking that he may have spoken the truth without meaning to.
Not in love with anybody.
Still, to her way of thinking, a man was not like that. He never rejected a woman just because he didn’t love her. She went back to her original idea.
“You know, it could be just a little thing. Have you thought of seeing a doctor?”
He turned to her with such vehemence that his elbow jabbed into her rib.
“What the hell do I need a doctor for? What are you talking about? Why don’t you shut up and go to sleep?”
“I just thought—”
No, she couldn’t talk to him now, he was too angry. She expected him to get up and leave the bed. He simply lay as he had been, facing away from her.
She lowered her head to the pillow and closed her eyes.
After a while he said, through clenched teeth, “Don’t need a doctor.”
She forced herself to answer. “I didn’t say you need one. But sometimes if you’re worried about something, and you go to a doctor and they tell you you’re all right, it helps you feel better.”
“Saw a doctor,” he muttered. “Ages ago. Nothing but talk. Can’t fix anything talking. He didn’t make her come back.”
Barbara?
“It was her fault,” he went on. “She forgot about me.
All those damn—I went looking for her. Couldn’t—couldn’t—”
He turned his head slightly. In the dim earthlight, she saw that his eyes were closed.
“Forgot about me, God damn you. Whaddaya expect? Go strutting around with your tits, wagging your ass for the boys. A goddamn whore.”
Barbara?
Or me?
“Carl—”
“Shut up, bitch, I don’t want to hear it. Don’t—talk—me—grow up. Goddamn boys. I hate you, shut up.”
She almost thought she saw a tear on his cheek, but he flung himself away, his back to her again, and lay like a block of steel.
She dared not move. It might set him off. He might—He hated her.
But why? What had she done?
Unless—
Not her. But who? Barbara? Olivia? Daniella?
Daniella…
Daniella…
She stared at the ceiling. The room was pale gray, shadowy, as though the darkness was something she could touch. The fan blew across her with fingers of wind. Next to her, in his crib, Adam made a small sniffing noise as he slept.
She stared at the ceiling and wondered, What do I do now?
During the night she dreamed about Larry. It seemed as though she was back in that basement apartment on Bleecker Street and all that had happened afterwards was a fantasy.
She woke slowly, with Larry breathing beside her. She could feel his warmth, feel where his weight depressed the mattress. She had no thought but that it was Larry, until she opened her eyes and saw the room. Not quite right, this room. She had seen it before, but…
Her confusion lasted only a moment, then seemed to peel off and fall away. Last night came clearly back and she felt cold, although the sun was up and the day already warm.
Adam was beginning to stir. She slipped out of bed without disturbing Carl. Through the open window she could see the meadow, glistening clean in the early morning light and alive with the singing of birds.
She lifted Adam from his crib. The clock radio on the nighttable gave a little pop and began to play softly. Carl sat up. He looked at her, standing beside the bed with the baby in her arms, and gave her a wry-comic smile.
“Another day, another dime,” he said.
She managed to smile back. It’s all right, she told herself. It’s all right.
By the time she had finished feeding Adam and joined Carl downstairs, he was already eating breakfast. He made a gesture of pushing out her chair so she could sit down. Her familiar Carl. Nothing remained of last night, not even a memory. Perhaps he had only been tired. Or she had misunderstood.
That telephone call to the Lemich family. It was sweet of him.
But something still nagged at her. Something she could not identify and didn’t want to think about.
“So you want to go somewhere on my vacation?” he asked.
“It’s not important. Whatever you want.”
“Maybe a short trip. It just seems like such a hassle, with the kid.”
“It is a hassle. I was thinking of the girls. But they’re all right. Some people would consider this a vacation, out here in the country.”
“As long as they don’t have to go to school,” he agreed. “That’s vacation enough.”
He kissed her good-bye when he left.
Tonight?
she wanted to ask, but kept her silence.
She was loading the dishwasher when Sheila called.
“Got a minute?”
“Special for you,” said Joyce. “Otherwise I don’t ‘got a minute.’ What are you doing up so early?”
“You mean what am I doing on the telephone so early. I’m always up. It’s about tonight. We’re having this meeting and I have to call about a thousand people, starting with you.”
A sort of town meeting, she went on to explain. With the police.
“To talk about this thing. The police are really getting it rough. You know, if you don’t pick up a lead, you don’t, but the whole village is on their backs. Well, you’d think they could come up with something. Look, now I’m doing
it myself, and I know what they’re going through. But I know what the rest of us are going through, too.”
“So you want me to come.”
“Don’t you want to? Don’t you care about getting at this thing before it gets us?”
“I—guess so.”
“What I hate is not being able to do anything,” Sheila went on. “At least this is something. And the police are going to give us some tips on keeping safe. Do you want Foster and me to pick you up? Around seven-thirty? It starts at eight.”
Again that odd, overdone heartbeat. She did not know why. Some premonition. She didn’t want to leave her home.
“I don’t know. The children—”
“For God’s sake, leave them with Carl. Unless he wants to go, too. You could bring them all over here. I think June is old enough, and Denise and Mary Ellen, as long as they bolt all the doors.”
“I really don’t think Carl would be interested. And he’s not—I mean—sometimes he has to work late.”
“Why don’t you call him? Find out if he’ll be home. Bring the kids over here and we can all go together.”
“Okay, I’ll let you know.”
She was relieved to have put it off. Maybe she could think of something. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to help. It was—She didn’t know. The children, perhaps. She didn’t even want to leave them with Carl. She wanted them where she could see them.
And what difference would it make whether she did or did not go to the meeting? She couldn’t help them. The police were doing all they could. Sooner or later they would break through. It had happened with those other freaks, the Son of Sam, the Boston Strangler, Charlie Chopoff…
Crazy people. All of them. Really out of it, at least some of the time.
Yet someone must have known. Someone close to them must have known how crazy they were, but perhaps they thought…
Well, you just wouldn’t ever think it, when it’s someone you know. It doesn’t seem possible.
No, she thought, I don’t mean that. Not about
me
. Just because a person had a childhood trauma. And not even a serious one at that.
She refused to think about it. It was ridiculous. She would know, if there was anything worth thinking about.
She did not call Carl. He disliked being bothered at the office, and when he came home she was glad she hadn’t. He was in one of his silent moods.
“Dinner’s all ready, so don’t be long,” she told him as he started upstairs. “I have to go to a meeting.”
He grunted an answer. The phone rang and it was Sheila, wanting to know what her plans were. She felt as though Sheila were trapping her. She really wanted to stay home with her children.
“I don’t know. I have sort of a headache.”
“Take an aspirin. This is important. We’ll be there at seven-thirty.”
“Wait a minute, let me ask Carl.”
He had just gone into the bathroom, but not yet turned on the shower. Quickly she explained about the meeting. Would he want to go, or would he look after the kids?
Instantly Gail came out of her room, her face stricken with anxiety. Mary Ellen looked up from the floor of her own room, where she lay writing another letter.
“Hell, no,” Carl replied. “I’ve had a full day already. Think I want to go and listen to a bunch of idiots shooting off their mouths? Leave the kids, leave the dishes. The kids’ll take care of everything.”
“You hope.”
She finished her phone call and served the dinner. As they took their places at the table, Mary Ellen, with a quick glance at her father, asked, “Why can’t I go to that meeting?”
Gail looked up hopefully. “Me, too.”
“It’s for grown-ups,” said Joyce. “It can’t last more than a couple of hours. And you’ll be having a lovely time with the dishes.”
Feeling uneasy, she sat down in the chair Carl pulled out for her. His manners were impeccable. But the girls—why were they so eager to go?
Maybe they thought it would be an adventure. She might have considered taking them—certainly they had a stake in it, too—except for what the meeting could disclose. There might be details they shouldn’t hear.
“You’re not eating,” said Carl. “I thought you were in a big hurry.”
“I am.” She picked up her fork, but she wasn’t really hungry.
She had changed her clothes before dinner. Adam was fed and sleeping. She was ready before the Farands came for her, and helped the girls clear the table, to distract herself from the odd feeling in her stomach. A feeling of nervous dread. She could not understand it.
“They’re here, Mommy,” Gail told her.
Both girls stood at the kitchen door to wave her off. She might have been leaving for Siberia, for the size of the pang she felt.
“Do you always get a send-off like that?” Sheila asked.
“I don’t usually go away like this. I guess it’s a pretty big event.”
The meeting was to be held in the high school auditorium. As they drew into the already crowded parking lot, she forgot her private panic, whatever the cause of it, and began to appreciate the community feeling all around her. There had never been anything like this in the big sprawling city. Or if there was, she had not had time for it.
They joined the throngs that swarmed into the auditorium. Not long after they arrived, all the seats became filled and latecomers had to stand.
On the stage was a row of chairs and a lectern with a microphone. At ten minutes past eight, five men and three women filed out to the chairs. She recognized Chief D’Amico. One of the men looked at his watch, stood up, and approached the lectern.
It was stuffy in the large room, even with the windows open and several large fans blowing from the wall.
Again for a moment she saw the two girls waving
good
-
bye.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” the first speaker began, “we have come here tonight for a very unpleasant reason, and I can see it’s touched a lot of you. I have to admit, we never expected this much turnout.”
A murmur went around the audience.