Darling (9 page)

He grabbed her, threw her over his shoulder, and marched across the parking lot.

As he approached the supermarket, one of the lights flickered on overhead. A warm breeze tickled his face. He wondered if it was an acknowledgement.

“For you, my darling,” he whispered.

* * *

Mike sat on the curb and stared into his coffee. Sipped it. Wished he added more sugar, more cinnamon, more
something
, to offset the bitterness.

Maybe it’s not the coffee that’s bitter.

Whatever. He never liked coffee much anyway. He just bought the thing as a way to kill time while he waited for Dennis. He took another sip, holding the giant plastic cup in both hands like a child’s sipping cup. His bags and suitcase were crowded around him on the sidewalk and he rearranged them as people filed into the shop. Not that it mattered; they were still obvious and everyone still stared.

So what? I got kicked out. Big deal. I was moving out anyway.

A group of teenagers came giggling toward the coffee shop, two young guys in stylish T-shirts with the forearms of baseball players, a petite bubbly girl on each arm. One of them kicked Mike’s red duffel bag as he walked by. It wedged between his back and his suitcase.

“Watch where you put your shit, dude,” the ballplayer said. One of the girls laughed.

Mike glared at his back as the group went inside.

Fuck him. He doesn’t know who you are. Go in there, throw your hot coffee in his face, then break his nose.

He shook it off. As his Dad always said, “It’s not a Smart Thing to do, Michael.” He didn’t know exactly what constituted a Smart Thing, but his father assured him he never did one, whether by accident or design.

Maybe it is a Smart Thing, maybe it isn’t. But you need to stop getting pushed around.

He ground his teeth together and stared into his coffee.

It’s what Dennis would do.

Is it? Would Dennis go in there and break that guy’s face just to prove a point? Mike doubted it. Dennis knew what a Smart Thing was. Those guys never would have talked to Dennis like that, anyway. People didn’t push Dennis around. They didn’t laugh behind his back.

Why did he care what Dennis would do, anyway?

Headlights blinded him. He blinked. Turned his head. A green Saturn rolled up to a stop in front of him. The trunk popped open. Someone got out. Mike rubbed his eyes and stood.

“Hey, Mike.” It was Eileen. “Thought you might want to take a ride in the Saturn, since Dennis said you were interested in it.”

“Oh. Yeah. Sure.”

“Hey, man.” Dennis grabbed Mike’s things and threw them into the trunk. “Wanna talk about it?”

“Maybe later. I’m just so goddamned pissed.”

Dennis climbed into the backseat. “Take shotgun. Eileen can tell you about the car.”

Mike nodded and climbed in.

“Buckle-up,” she said. “We’ll take back roads. Nice night for it.”

“Sure,” he said.

As she pulled away he glanced inside of the coffee shop and saw the ballplayers laughing.

Laughing at me behind my back.

No one’s laughing at you, he told himself. Probably telling jokes. Calm down.

“So it’s got eighty thousand miles on it. Air conditioner works. So does the CD player.”

“Why are you selling it?”

Dennis leaned forward. “She’s getting a hybrid.”

She laughed. “It’s silly, I know. But with gas prices and everything…besides, I want to do my part for the environment, ya know?”

He nodded agreement, but he didn’t know. In fact, Mike didn’t give two shits about the environment.

“It’s an automatic, too,” she went on. “Dennis said you’ve never driven before, so it’ll be a lot easier to learn on.”

Dennis said, huh? Does Dennis often talk about me when I’m not around?

Jesus, Mike. Get a hold of yourself. The world isn’t out to get you, you know?

It sure feels like it.

“…and airbags.” She patted her steering wheel.

“Cool,” he said. He’d missed most of what she’d said, but didn’t care. It had four wheels and would keep him from taking the bus or having his parents drive him everywhere. That’s all he cared about. A little autonomy. A little solitude. A little control. Not a lot of these things, just a tiny amount. That wasn’t too much to ask, was it?

His Dad’s voice echoed in his ears: “A car’s a big responsibility for a man.” But everyone he knew had a car. How big of a responsibility could it be?

“How do I get insurance?”

Dennis leaned forward again, wedging himself between the seats so he could face Mike. “After you get the title and registration in your name, we’ll call my insurance company. It’s easy to set up.”

Title and registration?

He opened his mouth to ask, and then thought better of it. He’d ask Dennis later, when Eileen wasn’t around. No point in letting her know how unfamiliar he was with cars.

“So, twelve hundred, huh?”

“Yep.” She turned the radio on and tuned through several stations until she found one she liked. She tapped her fingers against the steering wheel
.
“Twelve hundred.”

“Deal,” he said.

She looked at him, her eyebrows raised. “You sure?”

He smiled. “Yeah.”

* * *

Dennis flicked on a lamp and tilted it to shine on Mike’s face. “Oh, yeah. It’s swelling.”

“Great.”

He moved the lamp back into place and walked into the kitchen. After Eileen had left, Mike told Dennis every detail of his fight with his parents. None of it had surprised him, especially the punch. He just hoped things weren’t irreparable between Mike and his folks. He knew how bad that could feel.

He grabbed a bag of snap peas from the freezer and tossed it to Mike. “You should hold that against your face. It’ll keep the swelling down.”

Mike nodded and placed the bag against his jaw. He hissed at how cold it was, jerked it away. Grimaced. Reapplied it. “Burns.”

“Yeah. Don’t hold it there for more than thirty seconds, then reapply it every minute or so. There’s a bag of broccoli up there, too, when that starts to thaw.” Dennis slumped down in his brown leather chair, one of the few things he still had of his mother’s. It always made him feel good, no matter what he was sick with or what problems bothered him. The chair soaked these worries up like it did his body heat.

Aside from the chair, all he owned of hers was a silver crucifix, an old rocking chair she used to scoot next to the fire and knit in, and a framed picture of her and his father on her prom night. He loved that picture most of all; she was so young and vibrant in it and he could almost hear the laugh that had been captured on her face every time he looked at it. Her long hair hung down over her green dress, tangling around the white corsage she wore. Her eyes were brilliant and smiled with the rest of her face. Behind her his father stood in his Marine dress blues, the lights glinting from his gold buttons and creating a thousand tiny lens flares. His hair was cropped close and his face gentle; smiling in response to her laugh, unable to hide while in her presence the way he would later in life, after she had gone and all he had were anger and tears. They were happy in that picture, before Dennis came along, and he cherished it.

He wondered if Mike’s family was ever that happy?

They weren’t at any point he had known them. Even before Allison had died, the Pritchett family was…
off.
That was the best word he could think of to describe them. Just
off
. He knew they loved their children, and he assumed they loved each other, but there was always a stream of acid flowing through that home.

He was going to mention it to Mike, but thought better of it. “So,” he said, “the car.”

“Yep.” Mike pulled the ice pack away and grinned.

“How does it feel? The car, the apartment, school…?”

“Good.” He nodded, and then shrugged. “I don’t know. A little scary, too.”

“Yeah. I understand that. It’s always a little frightening to take control for the first time.”

“It’s not just that. I mean, that’s a big part of it and everything, but what if…never mind.” He reapplied the ice pack.

Dennis leaned forward. “What?”

“Well…it’s just…what if I fuck up?”

He laughed. “And how would you fuck up?”

“I don’t know. Forget an insurance payment, fail a class, break a leg. Hell, get into a car accident. I don’t know.”

“You’re not gonna fuck up.”

“But what if I do?”

“Then you’ll deal with it.”

Mike shook his head. “But what if my parents never want to talk to me again? If I fuck up royally and need their help or have to move back home or—”

“Stop it. Okay? You’ll be fine. And you’re not going to have to move back home. Alright?”

“I guess.”

Dennis sunk back into the chair. “Your parents aren’t going to disown you, anyway. They love you. They’re just…”

“Assholes?”

He smiled. “Yeah. Assholes.”

Mike nodded and leaned his head back onto the arm of the couch. He closed his eyes. He was silent for a moment, long enough for Dennis to wonder if he’d fallen asleep. Then: “Do you think I’m an asshole?”

“You’re not an asshole, Mike.”

“Hmph.”

“A dipshit, maybe. But not an asshole.”

Mike threw the peas at him. Dennis plucked them out of the air with one hand and jumped from his chair. “These are thawing already? I’ll get the broccoli.”

As he passed he ruffled Mike’s hair. Mike smoothed it back into place.

Dennis traded the bags of vegetables out. “Here. You want me to bring you a pillow and a blanket?”

“Huh?”

“You’re sleeping on the couch, right?”

Mike looked around, confused. It reminded Dennis of Eileen’s cat whenever it heard a strange noise. “I don’t know.”

“Well, it’s that or the floor, because you sure as hell ain’t sleeping with me.” He turned and headed toward his bedroom. “I’ll get you a pillow.”

“And a blanket.”

Dennis sighed. “And a blanket.”

He pulled them out of a box labeled
Bed Stuff
and brought them over. He dropped the pillow on Mike’s face and tossed the blanket on top.

“Hey!”

“Good night. If you need anything…”

“I know, I know. Night.”

That kid never thanks me
. He went back into his room and shut the door. He shed his clothes, threw them into his mother’s rocking chair, and changed into a pair of pajama pants. The room was hot and humid and he opened the window.

It stuck an inch from the bottom. He yanked it, but nothing happened. He examined the frame and noticed an excessive amount of paint built up on it. Little bubbles had dried here and there and blocked the window.

He grabbed his pocketknife from the dresser and scraped some of the paint away. He tried the window again and it slid right up.

He paused, thinking he saw something flash from the corner of his eye, and stuck his head out into the night air. He scanned the field, expecting to see kids with flashlights wandering around the abandoned buildings. But the night was empty.

It was almost like one of those parking lot lights flickered. Probably someone in another apartment turning a light on.

A cool breeze settled into the room. He fell onto his bed and clicked the light off.

Not long after, as he started to sink into sleep, he heard a soft sobbing from the living room. He almost went out to check, but stopped. That’s what Mike’s mother would do. Besides, it would embarrass him. What he’s got to work through, those tears are probably the best way to do it.

Dennis ignored it and was soon asleep.

PART TWO

AUGUST

“All your renown is like the summer flower that blooms and dies; because the sun glow which brings it forth, soon slays with parching power.”

—Dante

The thick, oppressive heat of summer’s end had settled in to the Tennessee Valley. Nestled between the Appalachians on one side and the Cumberland Plateau on the other, the area trapped humidity like a barrel left out to collect rainwater. As July grew old, withered, and made way for August, the air grew heavier. To some it was like a coat wrapped around their shoulders, even when wearing nothing but swimming trunks. It made them tired, and made it hard to think, but this didn’t bother them much. Summer was not a time for introspection.

To others, it pulsed with malignancy, digging sharp fingers into each and every pore and crawling down their throats, gradually filling their lungs with balmy fluid, threatening to drown them with every breath.

Raynham Place itself lost a little color every summer. The sun leached a bit of vibrancy from its painted walls and the moisture gathering on its surface trickled ever downward, ripping bits of tint along with it, leaving pale streaks and deposits of rust behind. The inhabitants could always sense this change in weather the way a gambler senses that he’s been dealt a bad hand. They stayed inside more and more during the day, only venturing out to their jobs if they could avoid all else. They ran their air conditioners, roaring wall units crammed into windows with duct tape and rotted boards, and prayed for the days to give way to night.

At night they swam in the pool (though never alone), or left for groceries or to sample the bars that were scattered along Emory Highway.

In Apartment 112, Cody Tate was sprawled out on his bed. Melissa Sweikow lay perpendicular to him across the bottom. Their fingers danced against one another’s as they talked and laughed. They were naked and covered in sweat. They’d shower soon, but not yet. This was the part that they enjoyed the most. Like all new lovers, they found an intimacy after sex that was impossible to achieve under other circumstances. Naked, exposed, left out raw for the world to see, with no expectations or hesitations of what might come. There was a comfort in this kind of vulnerability that they relished and, though the night stretched on and they both had to work early, they didn’t want the moment to end.