S
he showed up at the baseball game Saturday afternoon. It was the last thing I expected. But I wasn’t surprised; she was a woman of unpredictable conduct.
I don’t know how long she’d been sitting in the bleachers. David pointed her out to me, as we left the field and it was our team’s turn at bat. “Isn’t that our neighbor?” he said, and pointed. He seemed uncomfortable about her presence. It was her all right, in khaki slacks and a tank top, wearing those damn sunglasses, and a scarf around her head, like she was being incognito. She didn’t acknowledge me when I looked right at her.
“What the hell is she doing here?” David said.
“I don’t know,” I said.
In the dugout, I told Bryan.
He turned, saw her, and said, “Oh shit.” He made a face, and shook his head.
“It’s her,” I said.
Bryan was gradually becoming visibly upset. “It sure is. Now why the
hell
would
she
be
here?
”
“I don’t know,” I said, softly.
“She’s never been here before, has she?” he asked.
“I don’t believe so.”
“How does she know about our games?”
I didn’t know that either. I certainly didn’t tell her.
“This is odd,” Bryan said.
“Yeah.”
“Something’s fishy,” he said. “Something smells like halibut.”
I felt self-conscious knowing she was watching, and terrified not knowing why she was here. I was scared that she was up to something, that she had a plan, that maybe she was now plotting
my
murder. It occurred to me, then, that she was doing her own spying, when I thought I was being pretty clever.
I sucked in my gut when I went up to bat. I wanted to impress her, and there was no one else here to impress—neither my wife nor my kids were all that interested in Saturday’s middle-aged men’s ball game. I wanted to hit a home run just for her—I wanted to hear her cheer and, hell, I wanted to hear the whole small crowd roar. I wanted to knock that ball right out of the park.
I was trying too hard. I struck out.
The Fritzes lost the game.
I didn’t want to face her in this defeat. I imagined she’d smile, kiss my nose, and say, “It’s only a game, Mr. Lansdale.”
But she was gone.
After a game—victory or defeat—the team always went to this certain sports pub and grill that had cheap beer and great food. I just wanted a few pints and a bacon cheeseburger … and sink into a corner.
Bryan wouldn’t leave me alone.
He sat with me, and his expression was grave. I wondered where David was, he seemed to have just disappeared.
“Philip,” he said, “this is bad.”
“How we lost?” I was being facetious; I knew what he was referring to.
“
That
was bad,” he said, grinning for a moment. He leaned forward, drinking his beer. The grin was gone. “I mean Mrs. Payne. She must be on to us.”
“How could she?” I said. “Does she have bugs in our homes? Does she know every move we make, every conversation we have?”
“She’s observant and smart,” he said. “Every killer is extremely cautious after the crime. There’s no other explanation. Her being there today was no coincidence.”
I couldn’t argue. “No. It wasn’t.”
“She was giving us a message,” he said.
“A message? And what is the message?”
“She was saying, ‘I know you’ve been watching me, so now I’m watching you.’ It was like a warning.”
“Come on, Bryan,” I laughed, “you’re getting carried away.” I didn’t want to tell him that these were my exact thoughts. I could have told him the truth right then and there, and maybe that would’ve cleared up the mystery. I didn’t have the courage to tell him. I felt small, sitting across from this ex-cop who had more balls than I ever would.
I realized that there were many traits in Bryan that I admired, and that I would like to have in my own makeup—but it’d never be. I was a coward, a louse, and I was putting our investigation into jeopardy.
I never would have made it as a cop. I couldn’t make it as a lawyer.
“Then
you
tell me why she was at the game, Mr. Smarts,” Bryan said, snapping me out of my self-pity. “You give me a good reason.”
I wanted to. I wanted to say,
Maybe because I’m fooling around with her
.
“I’m going to have to tell Roger,” Bryan said.
“You think you should?” My spine was crawling.
“For our sake, yes.”
“She’s not some psycho killer,” I said.
“How do we
know
this?”
I drank my beer.
Bryan said, “He’s out of town. Roger. Family thing. Monday, I’ll tell him what we suspect, what we know, and he can take it from there.”
That night, after midnight, the phone rang once.
I was lying in bed.
Ten minutes later, it rang once again.
Tina was sound asleep. I went into the kitchen, to the caller ID machine. It was
her
number. Before I could call her, it rang again, and I quickly picked it up.
“You’re there,” she said softly.
“You shouldn’t call at this hour.”
She giggled. “Did I wake the kids?” “You—”
“You looked cute in the baseball uniform today,” she said.
“So you were there.”
“You
know
I was.”
“You didn’t stick around.”
“A bit awkward if I did. And you were losing.”
“Yeah.”
“
Bad
ly.”
“Don’t rub it in,” I said. “What were you doing there?”
“It’s a public place,” she said. “Do I not have a right, as a member of the public?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Did you think I followed you? How vain. Maybe I was there for a completely different reason.”
“What reason?”
She giggled some more. “I followed you there. I saw you leave your house in that cute uniform and I decided to follow you. It seems fair—you’ve been watching me, now I am watching you.”
Bryan was closer to the truth than he understood.
“Then again,” she said, “maybe I was there to watch someone else.”
I said, “I wanted to hit a home run for you.”
“Isn’t that sweet.” She blew a kiss over the phone.
I said, “I want to come over.”
“Twenty minutes ago,” she said, “I was in the mood. The moment has passed. I’m going to bed. You’ll have to wait.”
“Wait? When?”
“Monday night. Same time.”
“Why not tomorrow night?” I asked.
“I’m busy all day tomorrow. I doubt,” she said, “I shall feel amorous.”
“What are you doing tomorrow?”
“That’s
my
business, and
my
business alone.”
“And what if I just came over right now? If I just marched over there and took you in my arms?”
“Don’t,” she said and she hung up.
Maybe she was playing a game; maybe she wanted to see if I was aggressive and would take control of the situation. I thought better of it. She was a woman who enjoyed control. And I didn’t want to risk experiencing her rejection.
S
he wasn’t home all Sunday. She left early, came home late. I imagined she was with another man—perhaps this Boyd Urick character from Las Vegas. I was jealous and knew it was an absurd thing to feel. If anything, I should’ve been ashamed of myself—
And I was. It may not seem like it, but I was. I was good at bottling it in. I knew that what I was doing was wrong, foolish, dangerous, and just plain stupid. I knew my actions would hurt Tina, would hurt my kids, would injure my entire family. I knew that something wasn’t right with Cassandra Payne that she could launch into such a sexual tryst right after her husband’s murder. Still, I coveted her; still, I didn’t want our encounters to stop. I was thinking with my prick, which is the worst thing any man in history can allow to think for him—it leads to an ugly road, and in my case, an ugly road in the middle of the night deep in the desert.
I counted every minute until the appointed hour that Monday night. I had a fresh bottle of Wild Turkey that I was going to bring, to share; and I knew that I would—finally—fuck her.
I looked into
the window.
She was playing the music, she had on the robe, she had an empty glass in hand, she was dancing about the bedroom.
“What light on yonder window breaks,” I whispered into the screen.
“Romeo? Romeo?” she said. “Is it truly you, Mr. Romeo?”
“It is I,” said I, “bearing gifts.”
She told me to come inside, the door was unlocked. I did. Again, the candle. I held out the bottle. She got a glass for me, from the kitchen, and we poured bourbon and drank. We kissed. I caressed her breasts, I rubbed my hand between her legs, but she kept eluding any attempts I made to entice her into the bedroom, on the couch, on the goddamn floor! “Silly goose,” she said, holding her glass out for more to drink.
She turned the volume up on the soft jazz, told me she wanted to dance. “I’ll watch you dance any time,” I said, but she told me she wanted me to dance with her. I wasn’t a good dancer, I informed her of this, but I was too drunk to care, and she certainly didn’t care.
We danced
. Our bodies close to one another, we moved to the music, to the night, and to the alcohol in our bloodstream. She took my shirt off and sucked on my nipples, gently biting them and causing me to jump. She laughed. I bit her nipples in turn, and she liked this.
We didn’t fuck. There was kissing, there was touching, there was mutual oral sex, but still she would not allow me to fuck her. When I asked her why, she said it wasn’t time, and when it
was
time, she would let me know. I was past the point of caring, naked with her, dancing still, most of the bottle of Wild Turkey gone, and my brain was again spinning with lust and booze.
Then it was time to go. “Jesus Christ,” I said, when I noticed it was four in the morning.
“Time does fly, yes?” she said.
I kissed her good-bye, and said, “Until next time, Juliet.”
“Next time, Romeo,” she said, but didn’t say when that would be.
Tina was awake
when I got into bed. “Where were you?”
I didn’t know what to say. Had she heard me come in through the back? I’d been very careful; maybe I was clumsy. I’d taken it for granted that she’d be deep asleep as she always was.
“Philip?”
“Yeah?”
“Where were you?”
“What do you mean, where was I?” I was so nervous, I should’ve given up right then and there.
She said, “I woke up and you weren’t here and I looked all over the house and you were nowhere. Your car was outside. I was worried.”
“Did you think the boogeyman took me?” Always make jokes when you get caught.
“Where
were
you?” she said. She was very serious.
“I was in my office,” I lied.
“I looked in your office. It was dark and empty.”
“I was also in the backyard.”
“I knew you were outside. I heard you coming in.”
“I was looking for meteors,” I said.
“What?”
“I heard on the news there’d be a meteor shower between two and four.” I thought it sounded convincing; I liked stargazing and she knew it.
“Bullshit,” she said. She moved near me, and sniffed. “You’ve been drinking. I can smell it on you.”
Could she smell Cassandra Payne on me? I could. I should’ve taken a shower.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Were you outside drinking with Bryan and watching for meteors?”
“Bryan is asleep.”
“Did you see a meteor?”
“No,” I said, waiting for a fight.
She sighed. “You’ve been drinking too much lately.”
“Yeah.”
“So have I,” she said. “Philip, I think we’re turning into alcoholics.”
“Not us.”
“I think so.”
“We’re okay.”
“It’s strange that I couldn’t find you. I even looked out back.”
“Did you go out back?”
“No.”
“I was there.”
“I didn’t see you.”
“It’s dark.” I was being the lawyer again, twisting the scenario in my favor.
“I don’t like this,” she said.
“Go to sleep, now,” I said, gently.
I didn’t expect her to stop asking me questions, but she said, “Okay,” and went back to sleep.
I had a hard time sleeping. I wondered if Tina believed me or not, and if it mattered. I had taken a shower before going back to bed, to get any telltale smells off my body—perfume and sex.
If Tina suspected anything, she didn’t let on; she acted as if our life was normal and usual. I kissed her good-bye and and sent her off to work and then I took my son to school and came back home and played dinosaurs with my daughter.
I waited all
day for Cassandra Payne to call, to give me a signal, about when we would meet next—tonight perhaps, although I realized that would be outrageous, to do such a thing the night after my wife almost caught me.
There was something also exciting about it …
The widow Mrs. Payne didn’t leave all day. Bryan and I drank beers and watched the house out of the corner of our eyes. We were being too obvious, I thought. This is how she knows.
Bryan was antsy—standing, sitting, looking nervous. He kept cracking his knuckles.
Where was David? He’d been scarce lately. I asked Bryan about him.
“I’m not his fucking keeper,” he snapped at me, “how should I know?”
“Relax,” I told him.
“I told Roger,” he said.
This I didn’t want to hear. “What did he say?”
“Not much.”
“What was the expression on his face?”
“Goddamn lawyer,” he smiled, and sat down. “I don’t know. I told him over the phone.”
“He didn’t say anything?”
“He said something to the effect that I had an interesting theory and he would look into it.”
I felt relieved. “He doesn’t buy it.”
“He thinks I’m full of shit.”
“
We
could be full of shit,” I said.
He frowned, looking away. “We could.”
I want us to be.
Past midnight. I
watched her house and drank vodka. There was no signal. There was no light on, no soft music seeping out and reaching my ears.
I slept next to my wife.
Wednesday yielded no contact from her as well. I almost called her—I had her number. Instinctively, I knew she would be angry if I phoned. I decided that if I didn’t hear from her today, I would call her tomorrow.
Early in the evening, an Oldsmobile pulled up in front of her house. A man in a cheap suit, with a strong build, got out. I recognized him as one of the Homicide cops that had been there before: Bryan’s connection in the department, Roger. I didn’t know if Roger was his last or first name. I was frightened, aghast. I was afraid for her—what would happen to her? Would they give her life, the death sentence, if she was guilty? I wanted to run across the street and tell the cop that everything Bryan said to him was a ruse. This was why he was here, wasn’t he? Following up on Bryan’s information, to check if she’d been lying about not leaving her house the night in question, to see if there was some motive for wanting her husband dead.
Tina knew something was wrong. It must’ve been pulsating off my body. At dinner, she said, “What is it?”
“What is what?” I said.
“Something heavy is on your mind.”
I couldn’t deny it. “Things have changed.”
“I know.”
“I mean, they need to,” I said. “I should go back to work.”
She looked at her food and said, “Maybe that’s a good idea.”
The unmarked police car didn’t leave all night. What the hell was going on in there? With another bottle of vodka, I sat in my office and watched the house. The lights were on, occasionally I saw a body—his, hers—walk about. What were they talking about? This was torture. At eleven-fifty, the living room light went off. At last, he was going to leave. He didn’t. The bedroom light to the side was on. I drank. It was twelve-twenty. I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to know what was going on. I snuck out back and went across the street. Going there, I knew what I would see, I
knew
what had transpired, I knew why this detective had been there for hours, so I shouldn’t have been surprised when I looked into the window and saw the two of them naked. I was angry—and it wasn’t just for the reason that she’d lured this man into bed (and who could blame him, with the prospect of a beautiful woman?), but that he was fucking her; he was on top of her, her legs were on his muscular, defined shoulders, and he was slamming his pelvis hard into hers, so hard I could hear their flesh slapping together, and she was crying out, “Oh yes, baby, yes,” and he was grunting and all I wanted to know was why did the bitch let this man behold the pleasure she’d deprived me of?
The detective left
early in the morning. I started drinking after my few hours of restless, Cassandra-filled sleep. In my dreams, she was letting every man I’d ever known fuck her, and she made me watch while I was tied to a chair.
I was testy with Jessica, telling her to leave me alone, telling her to shut up as I paced around the house. She looked at me with her sad, large eyes and I felt just horrible. There was no reason for my child to suffer any recriminations for my own lack of fidelity. Still, I obsessed over the woman across the street, allowing my desires—my cock—to guide me. I had no interest in sitting around with either Bryan or David today. Bryan said, “We need to talk,” and I said, “We’ll talk tomorrow,” and he said, “I think we should talk today,” and I said, “We’ll talk tomorrow.” I was a menace to society, driving around, almost causing two accidents, picking up Matthew from school. He seemed to know that there was something wrong—he kept glaring at me and wouldn’t say a word. He glared at me at the dinner table. Dinner was also a mess, hastily slopped together macaroni and cheese. Tina wasn’t there, it was Thursday, bar night for the girls. Jessica played with her dinosaurs. A sitcom was on TV. I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. When the kids settled into sleep, I was thankful. I sat outside with a bottle of something and watched, waiting for my signal. Nothing came, and I was too drunk to do anything even if she called me over, having binged all day, feeling like I was going to vomit. I went to bed; I don’t know what time it was, I simply fell on the mattress and closed my eyes and when I woke up—the bedroom light came on—Tina was standing there, staring down at me. She was a bit drunk herself, and disheveled—hair messy, lipstick smeared, blouse torn. Focusing my eyes, I noticed scratches on her face and chest, a small cut on her lower lip. It was past four in the morning.
“Didn’t even wait up for me this time?” she said. “Didn’t wonder and worry where I was?”
“Tina?”
“That’s me.” She made a silly pose, and giggled.
“What happened to you?”
She turned and looked in the mirror. “Oh God.” She touched her face. “Oh God, I got carried away.” She giggled again, then started to cry. It was very abrupt.
I sat up. “Tina—”
She turned, pointing. “Don’t come near me, you! You!
Don’t
you
even
come near me!”
I stood, swaying, feeling sick again.
She said, “You wanna know where I was? You wanna know what I was doing? I’ll tell you.
I was getting laid!”
I could feel it coming up from my stomach, the goddamn macaroni and cheese.