The Mysterious Case of Betty Blue (3 page)

Betty had the place all cleaned up, not
that Scott really cared one way or another, but she seemed to think
it was important.

Scott had been alone for far too long.
At some point one had to ask some serious questions.

She was in the bedroom airing his
clothes, folding laundry and putting his winter clothes away.
They’d been heaped up there for a while. It was a tedious job, one
requiring pure feel.

He had the TV on, listening to the
on-air personalities talking on the Weather Channel. It was his
routine, and routine was the one thing that had saved him from
going mad. One of the things, anyway. So what if she was crazy—she
was nice, and he knew how close he had been a time or
two.

Going mad was just one of those
things.

It could happen to anybody.

There was a rap of knuckles at the
door.

“
It’s okay, I’ll get it.”
His heart thudded in guilt for some reason.

It was probably Mrs. Jarvis, and yet
here he was a grown man—he paid rent. She had always been somewhat
solicitous, although royally ineffective at it. It’s just that he
had so few visitors.

She was governmentally
ineffectual.

He pulled the chain free. Turning the
little knob on the deadbolt, he opened the door. He couldn’t quite
see who it was, but there appeared to be two of them.

“
Yes?”

“
I’m Officer Bruce Nyall
and this is my partner, Officer Diana Wilson. We’ve been canvassing
the neighbourhood.”

“
Oh?”

Scott wondered if it was for a
subscription to something, raising money for some local
charity.

The cops were known to do that from
time to time. Then again they could be creeps trying to fake out a
blind man, gain his cooperation and then get him in trouble. He’d
seen one or two bogus ploys over the years, as often as not someone
who had befriended you right out of the blue.

“
So, what can I do you
for?” Scott played it cool.

All he saw were two vertical blobs,
elongated but nothing more. They could be real cops.

“
Ah, yes, sir. You are
Scott Nettles, and do you reside here?”

“
Ah, yes.”

“
Okay, sir. We’re trying
to locate a missing robot. She was last seen a few blocks from
here. The robot is described as a blue-skinned female, about
five-foot ten, with thick blonde hair and big dark
eyes.”

“
Ah. Well.”

“
Anyway, sir, have you
seen anyone or anything like that in the neighbourhood?”

“
Ah. No, but—”

Officer Wilson nudged Officer Nyall
with her elbow. She pointed, and following her glance, he noted the
long white cane standing just inside the door. It was leaning up
against a corner of the small front hall. It helped to explain the
man’s odd demeanor, blankly looking off over to one side above
their heads and with his left ear lowered to catch the nuances,
eyes wide and unfocused.

“
That’s okay sir, we’re
just checking around. Is there anyone else in the apartment with
you?”

“
Ah, no—just me and my,
ah, girlfriend.”

Officer Wilson’s eyes lit up a little
in empathy. It was sort of romantic for the poor guy to have
someone. She’d never really thought about it. It made her shock at
his blindness fade somewhat. It wasn’t that bad for the man.
Hopefully, maybe. Her heart went out to the more unfortunate of the
city’s residents; the bottom ninety percent. For her, this in her
third full year of being a cop, the duty really meant to serve and
protect. It’s why she signed up. She hoped she would never become
cynical. Some of her brother and sister officers sounded fairly
cynical at times, but she often wondered if that was just some kind
of emotional shield.

“
All right, sir, we won’t
take up too much of your time. Do you have a phone?”

Scott’s mouth was open in a half-witted
grin.

“
So you guys are looking
for a robot?” His belly muscles, shirtless as he was, convulsed at
the notion. “Heh-heh-heh.”

“
Ah, yes, sir.” Diana
spoke up now, with a smile evident in her voice. “Yes, sir. Please
call us if you notice anything. Someone might mention something,
you know?”

She pressed a business card into his
hand, mentally cursing herself as she did so, but he took it
readily enough. Maybe he’d be able to read it with his fingertips,
she thought, the names and numbers were heavily
embossed.

“
Officers Nyall and
Wilson. Okay, sir?”

He could always get a neighbour or the
landlady to read it for him.

“
Ah. Yes. Of course.”
Scott still had the ludicrous grin on his face.

Realizing a nod, or a tug at the cap
brim wouldn’t be of much use, Officer Nyall spoke up.

“
Okay. Good night sir.
We’re leaving now, and we’ll let you get back at it.”

“
Oh. Okay. Thank you,
officers. Good night.”

Scott closed the door and locked and
latched it all up again. Dimly he heard them move on to the next
unit, number six, and rap on the door. It was just down to the left
and across the hall.

“
Hmn. Don’t that beat
all.”

Scott turned and headed back to the
couch, still shaking his head.

“
Betty!”

“
Yes, dear?”

“
You are not going to
believe what just happened.”

She came out of his dingy little
bedroom with a white sock in one hand and a black one in the other,
and an inquiring look on her face.

“
What?”

Chapter Three

“
I have to get out of here
for a while. I try to get out as often as possible.” It was an
essential part of routine.

Single for all these years, Scott
never bought more than the twelve items allowed in the express
checkout. One or two small bags of groceries were all that he could
reasonably handle, what with the stick and all.

“
Are you okay on your own,
Scott?”

It was kind of a dumb question, but it
gave him an opening. It was an assertion of self, an act of
assertion. It was an important thing to do sometimes.

“
No problem.”

Scott needed air and Betty thought it
best if he went alone. She was planning to scrub the kitchen floor.
Scott admitted it hadn’t been done in a while, something she could
see for herself.

“
That way we won’t be
tripping on each other.”

“
Yeah. I’m a little too
used to my independence.” He smiled, getting the same feeling he’d
had more than once in the last couple of days.

He had laughed, of course—over the
years. He had a few friends, a few acquaintances. If someone told a
joke, of course Scott would laugh.

But this was different. This was
smiling. Almost as if smiling came naturally.

She kissed him on the cheek and the
cane was pressed into his hand.

“
It is kind of a small
place, even just for the two of us.”

“
Is there anything we
need? Milk, maybe?”

“
Yes. We could use milk.
And tea bags.”

He nodded, and Scott smiled again.
Fuck, what a thrill. His heart leapt. It had been doing that quite
a bit lately.

“
Kissy-kiss?” At one time
he would have thought anyone who said that a proper
fool.

Quite mad, really.

Not anymore.

She took him in her arms and Scott
wrapped his free arm around her. Their lips met and Scott enjoyed
some tongue and one or two thoughts for later.

“
Bye, lover.”

“
Bye.”

Fuck, I never thought I would say that
again. Or maybe I never have said it.

The latch snapped open and then Scott
was through the door and into the hallway.

Crap, with her there it was like he
didn’t want to leave, but routine had its role. She had to
understand a few things about him. She’d better know, otherwise she
would simply overpower him. Smother him, if he wasn’t
careful.

He laughed out loud on the
thought.

As long as my head’s between her legs
when it happens, who cares?

He grinned from time to time as he
walked.

Holy, crap.

Had his life ever changed.

And just this once, not for the worse.
Scott, as often as not, enjoyed his walk to Mel’s on the corner,
where the stock was never moved. He’d stopped going to the big
supermarket nearby when the new manager had gotten on some kind of
efficiency kick and moved everything in the place. Moving the
aisles and rearranging the shelves, the freezer cabinets and
everything, might have found another couple hundred square feet of
retail shelf space. Scott, he sort of took it as a personal
insult.

He’d gone in, making it in through the
turnstile no problem, and then walked smack-dab into some kind of a
low display. He never did figure out what that was.

Scott caught a sharp corner with a
hip. His pocket or his jacket snagged a tab of stainless steel, he
over-balanced, and then he went down, falling on the slender stick
and breaking it.

Being the centre of attention of a
bunch of strangers that he couldn’t even see was embarrassing.
Their comments, their voices, were just a stream of meaningless
noise. They all had something to say. It was a good thing he
couldn’t see them, he was sure he would have punched somebody. It
was the voices of the little kids standing over him. That was all
that stopped him. He hated humanity at that moment, and of course
they had to help him up, all worried about him. The staff had to
get someone to lead him around while he did his shopping—minimal as
it was.

All of their fucking apologies grated
on him, when all he wanted was to be left alone. The stock boy who
took him home hadn’t been properly briefed. Scott thought the kid
had forgotten exactly where he lived, until a couple of days later
when the store manager showed up at his door with a new white cane
for Scott.

More apologies, and Scott had been
barely polite to the man.

Fucking asshole. I’ll never shop there
again, Buddy. Give it up. And fuck you, too.

Fuck all of you.

If they were looking for some
feel-good publicity, Scott sure as hell wasn’t going to give it to
them.

But today was a better day, in fact a
wonderful day. It was a rare event in Scott’s
experience.

The breeze was warm, and the birds
were noisy and cheerful, the air was wet and the smell of
fermenting dog-shit everywhere you turned was a portent of spring.
Whatever. The traffic was just as heavy as usual. Somehow the cars,
trucks and buses didn’t seen quite so threatening, not so cold and
impersonal anymore.

The chess players, and the men with
Italian accents playing bocce-ball in the park, ignored him. They
never minded the weather either. Italians were full of life. No one
ever heard of a depressed Italian.

Crossing the street held no terrors
for Scott anymore.

He had acquired a kind of fatalism
over the years. It was a way of dealing with things.

It would happen someday.

Once you accepted it, things got
better. Scott felt kind of sorry, even ahead of time, for the poor
bastard who was slated to kill him. Just make sure you do it right.
Don’t leave me in a fucking wheelchair, okay, Buddy?

Do it right.

Man, that is one dark thought, and yet
he couldn’t quite shrug it off, either. Scott tapped his way down
the street.

Fuck, I wouldn’t wish that on anybody.
That is one burden I will never have to bear.

Yeah.

Now he had something to live
for.

Why does the chicken cross the road,
anyways?

Maybe he’s hoping someone will kill
him.

He’d done it a million times, and this
time was no different. The ‘pong’ of the signal changing and the
sound of cars accelerating was a reminder of pain, death and
injury, but so far, he’d been lucky.

You had to admit that. So far, no one
had run him over. Yet a forty-two year old man on a bicycle had
been killed by a pickup truck at this very intersection just a
couple of weeks ago.

Sticking close to the storefronts, he
found the fourth doorway to the left of the intersection of Queen
and Main streets.

The laundromat was busy, as always on
a Saturday, with the smells of laundry, the voices of women and
small children coming vaguely through the wall. There was the sound
of rotating dryers and squelching washing machines, the latter of
which, if you overloaded them, would leave a crust of dry soap on
your clothes because the water wouldn’t penetrate all the way
through. On a tight budget, Scott had only done that once or twice,
as doing the wash cost nine dollars and seventy-five cents per
load.