The Woman Next Door Read online

  So, let the kid cry! Let her! If she was wet, so what? If she was cold, so what? If she was thirsty, or afraid of the dark, or if there were spiders crawling all over her, who gave two shits? The kid deserved whatever she got!

  "I'm going to ask you some questions you may find uncomfortable."

  "I won't answer them."

  "It's really in your best interests. We want to help you."

  "We? Who's we?"

  "Everyone who knows you and cares about you. Do you think no one cares about you?"

  "I never thought about it."

  "Be truthful, now."

  "I never thought about it. I never, honest to freakin' God, thought about it. Jesus H. Christ, do you think everything I say is a freakin' lie?"

  "Of course not. Do you think that's what people think, that you're constantly lying?"

  "I never thought about that, either. I don't care what people think. I really don't."

  Or if she'd caught her hair in the crib springs, or fallen on her oh-so-pretty face, or got zapped into another freakin' dimension, who in the fuck gave a damn?

  The babysitter examined the rage that was building inside her; she was fascinated by it. It seemed so powerful, so all-consuming, like a great fire. And she knew she could control it, call it up at will. It was a rage that was almost pleasurable—a kind of sexual pleasure, she supposed.

  "Does your, uh . . . your physical development disturb you?"

  "Freakin' pervert!"

  "That is not my intention in the slightest, young lady, not in the slightest, and you can wipe that grin off your face, too."

  "Simpering son-of-a-bitching pervert!"

  "Your vocabulary is astounding. Now, will you please answer my question."

  "Why?"

  "Because we think your answer may have some bearing on what troubles you."

  Yes, it was there—her power—easily called up, easily controlled, an easy source of pleasure. Goddamn freakin' little shit-assed kid!

  The babysitter screamed loud and long. She found pleasure in it—enormous, dizzying pleasure. But there was pain, too, a pain that lingered long after the scream ended—pain in the accusations that had been made, in the questions that had been asked, in the shared, knowing glances.

  Damn that kid all to hell!

  "We are not communicating, Miss King. I really wish we could communicate."

  "Yeah? Is that why you ask about my freakin' tits, you pervert?"

  "Young lady, that language is appalling. They are not 'tits'; they are 'breasts.'"

  "They sure as fuck are, and they are big, aren't they, and you really want to get freakin' hold of 'em, don't ya, huh? Don't ya?"

  "You may be excused. And you may return only when you have decided to use language befitting a young lady."

  The babysitter despised the pain. The rage and the anger were wonderful, but the pain was nightmarish. And the horror of it was, the rage and the pain were inseparable.

  Chapter 28

  What happens now? he thought. I am dying In someone's cold attic, so what happens now?

  He decided that death was probably a couple days off. He would die of hunger. And of the injury to his head. Or—it was possible—be would die because he didn't know who he was or precisely where he was or why he had been put here. He would die because he was a nonentity.

  "Christ!" The word, unintelligible, stumbled off his lips.

  He found that he could turn his head slightly. He saw a floor-standing lamp nearby; its cord had been wrapped around its base, and it was minus a shade.

  "I don't know, it probably needs rewiring. I'll get to it one of these days."

  "Sure you will. Why don't you just put it upstairs, in the attic?"

  Sure you will . . . He let the voice repeat itself. He winced at the pain; he knew the voice, knew it well. It was a part of him, a part of his life. He was tied to it.

  Death was not a pleasant thing to think about. He was used to living, had grown to expect it. He remembered thinking it would be nice to be senile and babbling when death came, and so be ignorant of it.

  Dying of a head injury and hunger in someone's cold attic was . . . interesting. And bizarre. If it were someone else it was happening to, and he felt comfortably removed, he would comment sympathetically on it.

  "Look at what it says here. It says this guy was found dead in someone's attic."

  "It's no concern of ours, Brett."

  Brett?

  The pain was sudden, and severe, as if the left side of his head had been pumped up with small, pointed stones.

  He heard himself scream. He hated himself for it, felt small and helpless.

  He smelled anchovies and mint jelly. Christ! A concussion!

  A wave of nausea flowed over him. It carried the smells with it; it settled on his eyelids and in a thick, undulating line down his stomach.

  He turned his head sharply and vomited. He turned his head again, away from the vomit.

  He welcomed unconsciousness as if it were an old friend.

  It was the first time Marilyn had noticed it and it unsettled her. It was around the eyes, she decided. Something she had seen before, a long time ago. Decades ago. It had unsettled her then, too. She wished she could recall it precisely, pin it down; then, she thought, it wouldn't unsettle her so much.

  She went on, wondering how long she had paused: "It's true, Christine: I haven't heard from Brett in days. His secretary and some of his workers have called, wondering where he is and what they're supposed to do, but what can I tell them? I haven't the faintest idea where he is." She paused again, looked away.

  "Is something wrong, Marilyn?"

  Marilyn looked back, saw the concern in Christine's eyes. But, mixed with it, alternating with it, the thing she had seen before—the determination. And the pain. "No, nothing," she said. "I'd tell you if there was."

  "I hope you would. I like to think we're friends, Marilyn."

  Marilyn looked sharply to the left, toward the stairs. Had Christine heard that scream? She looked back.

  "Marilyn, I wish you would tell me what's upsetting you."

  Marilyn stared quizzically. How could Christine not have heard? "Nothing." She stopped, listened, expected the scream to be repeated. It wasn't. "I think it's probably just . . . all that's been happening." She stopped again; Greg would have to get a good talking to.

  "You must get very lonely here," Christine said.

  Marilyn nodded once, grimly. "I do, on occasion. But it's a cross I can bear." She looked again toward the stairs, thought of asking Christine if she'd heard anything, "sort of like a scream." Because there really was no way she could have missed it. "Christine, did you—?"

  "I'm a cat lover," Christine interrupted. "I always have been. But I hate the sound of a cat fight, don't you?"

  Marilyn stared at her, bewildered. "Cat fight?"

  "I guess because cats can sound so . . . human."

  "Cats?" And, at last, she understood. She smiled a long-suffering smile. "Yes, of course. Personally, I hate cats. Dogs, too. Greg had a puppy once. I believe he thought more of it than he did of me."

  Christine smiled. "I'm sure it was your imagination."

  "I don't think so, but, at any rate, we were able to get rid of it." She stood. "Could you excuse me just a moment, Christine?"

  "Certainly."

  "I've got to check on Greg."

  "Oh? How is he?"

  "His cold is still hanging on, I'm afraid."

  "That's a shame. It's been a few days, hasn't it?"

  "Almost a week. I'll call the doctor if there's no real improvement soon."

  Greg wasn't certain what he'd heard: It had invaded his sleep, transformed his dreams, and awakened him.

  He sat up in the huge bed, caught a glimpse of himself in the floor-standing mirror opposite the bed, and looked away quickly.

  He wondered if it was Little Rat he'd heard, if Little Rat wanted him to wake up and so had called to him. No, he decided: Little Rat came t
o this room at night, when it was easier to sneak around. Besides, what he had heard sounded more like a siren. Or a scream. A scream like that he'd heard once before—the night his father left the house.

  He climbed determinedly out of the bed. He went to the door. And jumped back, but too late. The door swung open, and hit him hard. He tumbled backward, rolled reflexively. He lay still, on his stomach, momentarily breathless.

  Marilyn stepped into the room. "Stand up," he heard.

  He hesitated very briefly, then pushed himself to a sitting position. He put his hand on his forehead, took it away, saw a tiny smear of blood on his fingers. "I'm bleeding," he said, and realized that, in jumping back, he had stooped over just enough that the glass doorknob hit him. "I'm bleeding," he repeated, fascinated, disgusted, frightened by the sight of his own blood.

  "Stand up," he heard again.

  Clumsily, he stood and faced his mother.

  "We've discussed this before, haven't we, Greg?" "Yes, Mommy." He had no idea what she was talking about; he knew only what she wanted him to say. "And if I remember correctly, the last time we discussed it, Mrs. Bennet was here, too."

  The scream! "Yes, Mommy."

  "You have almost frightened her to death this time. You realize that, don't you?"

  "Yes. I'm sorry."

  "Right now she's down in the parlor trying to catch her breath. I think she'll be okay, no thanks to you." She paused, conjured up a look of authority mixed liberally with pity. "You know what this means, don't you?"

  He nodded.

  "Don't you?"

  "Yes."

  "I just want you to know that the more you act up, the longer you behave like a little animal, the longer you'll stay here."

  He touched his forehead again, looked at his fingers. The bleeding had stopped.

  Marilyn stepped toward him; he flinched.

  "Yes, Mommy."

  Marilyn grinned. "That's a good boy." She moved closer, held her arms out. "Hug me," she cooed.

  He stepped forward without hesitation, found himself enveloped in her arms, squeezed to her big, hard breasts. He cringed at the smell of lilac perfume mixed with her nervous perspiration.

  "I love you, my Greg," he heard.

  The absence of pain confused him. He felt only a small itching sensation at his groin, inside, just above his testicles. And he was lightheaded. He knew that if he stood, he would fall. It was, he realized, the hunger working on him.

  "Hello," he whispered. "My name is Brett Courtney," and felt a broad smile spread across his face. He saw himself smiling in his mind's eye and recognized the face. Names and dates and places that were a part of his life nudged at him, shouted at him, flooded back into his consciousness. He closed his eyes tightly, suddenly dizzy and nauseous: The return of identity had overwhelmed him, because with it had come the damning and awful knowledge that this was his attic he was dying in, and it was his wife who had put him here.

  He saw that it was night. A dull, creamy light, from the city itself, had invaded the attic, though not its farthest corners. And though it was cold here, that light had a comforting, dreamlike quality. At this moment you are safe, it told him. Because Marilyn was frightened of the attic even in daylight, he could not imagine that at night she did more than hurry past its door—especially now that her husband's body lay beyond it. If in fact she was convinced that he was dead. And that was something he could not know.

  At any rate, there would come a time—perhaps soon, perhaps the following day—that she would want to rid her house of him. And if she found him still alive. . . .

  Chapter 29

  It had been over a week and there were distasteful realities to face. Marilyn had known it would come to this. Time was not about to stop for her. And time brought decay with it, and decay brought—

  She thought, suddenly, that she had done few foolish things in her life. She had rarely had to answer to anyone, except once as a teenager and once to Brett, a couple years after Greg was born.

  ("Listen, Brett, you want another kid, you conceive it. I do not want to become pregnant again. I've discovered what pain is, and it doesn't appeal to me."

  "But, Marilyn, we've discussed this.")

  Asshole! Wanting to populate the world with little carbon copies of himself.

  She thought she could smell him already. Rationally, she knew she probably couldn't, because the attic was cold and dry, and decay didn't happen very quickly in cold, dry places.

  She plunged her hands deep into the pockets of her housedress, made tight fists, let her hands relax, flexed her fingers.

  She had been standing near the front windows. It was midmorning, and a sparse snowfall had started. It wouldn't last long, she knew. In an hour or so the sun would come out, and the couple feet of snow on the ground would begin to melt. Spring was close, she thought; it was going to come early this year.

  The phone rang. She jumped at the sound, crossed the large room quickly. It rang again. "Christ!" She snatched up the receiver:

  "Yes?"

  "Mrs. Courtney?"

  "Yes. Who's calling?"

  "This is Shirley Wise at the Middle School. I'm calling about your son, Greg."

  "Yes?"

  "I'd like to know when we can look forward to seeing him again."

  Marilyn sensed the woman's forced good humor and was annoyed by it. "That's hard to say, Mrs. Wise."

  "Ms. Wise."

  "Ms. Wise. It really is hard to say, because this sickness of his is not at all predictable and—"

  "Is he under a doctor's care, Mrs. Courtney?"

  "Of course he's under a doctor's care!"

  "I was only inquiring, Mrs. Courtney. His classmates do miss him, and we all wish him well."

  "Is that all, Ms. Wise?"

  "Yes, thank you. Oh, by the way, we'll be sending some work home to him, if you don't mind, if you think he's up to it."

  "I'd rather you didn't do that, Ms. Wise. I'd rather he was allowed to rest."

  "Oh, yes, of course. Please keep us informed, Mrs. Courtney."

  "I'll do that, Ms. Wise."

  Marilyn hung up. She tapped her foot against the rug, folded her arms over her breasts. She frowned.

  Problems, she thought. Always problems.

  The itch was on the inside of her left wrist. A nervous itch; if she ignored it, it would go away. She scratched the wrist, at first lightly. The itch persisted. "Damn!" She scratched harder, became aware that she could feel the itch beneath her nails, as if it were inside, on the bone, taunting her. "Damn it to hell!" She went through the skin; a tiny bead of blood appeared.

  The itch vanished. She smiled, relieved, and watched the bead grow, become a drop. She held the wrist up so that the blood could run. "Good," she said, and sucked delicately at it.

  The flow of blood soon stopped.

  She pulled the attic door open.

  The stench moved over her like syrup. Her breathing stopped in reaction to it. She slammed the door shut, leaned with her back against it, her arms wide, as if to hold it closed, as if the stench were a physical thing.

  The itch settled in her right wrist. She threw herself away from the door and down the hallway to her bedroom.

  She sat trembling on the edge of the bed, her nails working hard at her wrist, trying in vain to destroy the itch there.

  She opened the armoire door slowly, carefully. There were treasures here, a life here. She lifted out one photograph, then another, and set them in the box beside her on the floor. Again she reached into the armoire, picked out some more photographs—a dozen of them—put them in the box. Eventually, the box was filled. She put her hands on the flaps to close it and saw Brett's face looking up at her, here and there wearing a photographic smile, all his teeth straight and white. She grinned back at him and closed the box. The past is the past, she thought. Why leave its props lying around cluttering things up?

  She carried the box to the back door, opened it, crossed to the garage, went around the side of it
to the back, where the garbage cans were. She searched until she found an empty one, then dumped the photographs in. She smiled hugely. The sound of metal hitting metal and glass breaking pleased her. She wished it could continue for longer than just a few moments.

  Greg said, "She's throwing something away." He turned from the window. "She's throwing something away," he repeated.

  "Yeah," said Little Rat. He was seated on the floor, his back against the bed's long side, his hands behind his head, his legs outstretched. "I know she is."

  Greg turned back to the window. "She's coming back now. I wonder what she threw away."

  "I know what she threw away," Little Rat said, and he grinned a big, wide, gloating grin. "But I ain't gonna tell ya."

  "Why aren't ya?"

  "'Cause ya wouldn't know what I was talking about, that's why."

  "Sure I would."

  Little Rat seemed to think about that a moment. Then: "Okay, what if I told ya it was the past she threw away? What would ya say about that?"

  Greg didn't know what to say about it. As far as he was concerned, it was dumb, because it was impossible to throw the past away. The past wasn't real, and only real things got thrown into trash cans.

  Greg laughed. Little Rat had told him a joke, and though he didn't get it, he wasn't about to let Little Rat know.

  Little Rat was suddenly standing. Greg's false laughter died instantly. Sometimes Little Rat scared him. "I'm sorry," Greg said.

  Little Rat glared at him. Greg hated it when Little Rat glared; he looked so angry, so round-eyed, so hollow. Like a marionette.

  The look softened. "I got to be going," he said. He turned and started for the door.

  "When you comin' back?" Greg called.

  Little Rat made no reply. He put his hand on the doorknob, turned it, opened the door, and left the room. The door slammed shut after him.

  Greg's mouth dropped open. He ran to the door. He tried the knob. The door was locked.