Fear Itself (17 page)

“There’s nothing to talk about.” She said with her childish voice.

“Honey, I love you. I need to talk to you. I think we got a little confused and we need to talk about this.”

“I want to go back to live with grandma and grandpa.”

Her words were a stiff blow to my gut. I started to weep. I slumped to the floor with my back pressed to the door while a stream of saline drizzled down my cheeks. “Come on honey,” I cried, “let me in. I need to talk to you. We need to make this right. If I don’t have
you
then I might as well be dead.”

After a few minutes I heard her slide off of her bed and her little feet hit the floor before she padded to the door and pushed something aside. She padded back to her bed and I heard the squeak of her mattress springs as she hopped back into bed and I heard the shrug of cloth being filled with air as she pulled the covers over her body.

I struggled, my motor skills still affected by the whiskey, to pull myself up by the door handle; then I slowly opened the door.

Sarah had the covers pulled over her head. I knew that she was both confused and embarrassed. I knew too that it was not her fault. I had encouraged her, not with the intent of molestation, but by having her overtake the physical role which Catherine had once held. She had confused matriarchy with marriage; sex with love.

I sat on the edge of the bed and I reached under the covers and found her warm little hand. I squeezed it. She pulled it away.

“You don’t love me.” She said again;

the white cover still over her head made it seem as if I were talking to a Halloween ghost.

“Oh, yes I do, more than you will ever know.” I tried to speak in an authoritative and fatherly tone.

“You love Amber more than me.”

“Not true. What I have with Amber is very different than what I have with you, but I could never love anyone as much as I love you.”

you?”

“You were with her tonight, weren’t

“No, honey, I wasn’t.”

She pulled the covers down enough for me to see her eyes. “What was Amber doing to you when I saw you together?”

I took a deep breath. It was quite obvious that she had spied on Amber and me during intercourse. I had hoped never to have to have
that
conversation with her. “That was sex. It’s something grownups do. It’s how we make babies.”

“I want to be a grownup. I want to make a baby.”

“And you will someday, but even then, I’m your dad and I can’t have sex with you.”

“What if we get married for real?”

“We can’t. I’ll always be your dad and dads can’t marry their little girls. Besides, I will love you more if you’re my baby forever than if we were to get married. Married people sometimes get divorced. Dads don’t get divorced from their little girls. Isn’t that better than being married?”

Sarah took a long pause, “I guess so.” “You shouldn’t be embarrassed for what you did. You just wanted to show me how much you loved me. You just got it a little confused. But it’s okay, really. I love you no matter what and you love me no matter what, right?”

“Yes.” She pouted her lip.

“And this will be a secret. I won’t tell anyone it happened and you don’t either, okay?”

“Okay.”

I pulled her to me and I cradled her in my arms, the blanket still wrapped around her body, and I held her as if she were an infant and I rocked her and hummed to her until she fell asleep. Then I tucked her in and kissed her on the forehead.

* * *

What would Catherine have said to me had she been alive I wondered of Sarah’s destructive behavior; of her confusion of roles; of her murderous act? Catherine, being a soul elevated far above the level of trivial pettiness, would have said “I told you so!”

Was it old William Shakespeare said that “sarcasm is the lowest form of wit”? I felt much lower than
sarcasm.
But leave it to

Melanie to stop by during the wee hours of the morning and cheer me up as I sulked and waited for the miserable effects of the whiskey; the throbbing head, the churning queasy stomach, the addled brain; to wear off while rocking compulsively in my rocking chair. Melanie knocked softly at the rear door at six- thirty in the morning, a knock that I confess I mistook for a mouse scratching the plaster behind the floor-molding. Melanie’s second attempt was slightly harder and louder and I got up on unsteady legs and answered the door.

Melanie was Beautiful, her hair freshly washed and her face made up, even while she sported a frumpy red pocket-tee and a pair of loose-fitting blue-jeans.

“I thought you might want some coffee and some company.” She smiled cheerfully, as if the whiskey had had no ill effect on her, and handed me a Styrofoam cup of gourmet coffee, the aroma of which tickled the
happy
receptors in my brain. But a red light was flashing deep inside my skull telling me that I was in trouble.

“Thank you, that was thoughtful.”

“I actually wanted to talk to you about last night.” She looked down at her white tennis-shoes and then back up at me.”

“I know… we shouldn’t have…”

“But I’m glad we did.” She interrupted, her green eyes gazing up at me seeking complicit sympathy.

“But what about Amber? She’d be hurt if she knew.” I searched her eyes for the least hint of remorse.

“I thought about that…I mean I love Amber and she’s my best friend in the world, but she is married and you know she’s never going to leave Charlie…and I think she sees you as, well…a sex toy.” “You may be right about that, but it was wrong for us to go behind her back like that.”

“We were drunk, and anyway I’ve wanted that to happen since you first moved in to my place.” Her eyelashes batted flirtatiously as she rose on her tip-toes. “It’s the reason I asked you to be my security.”

“You wanted me to see you strip naked and dance in front of a bunch of creepy men while I watched because you wanted to…make love to me?”

She rolled her eyes like a silly child, “I know. I thought about it afterwards and that was pretty dumb.” She smiled a bit embarrassed, “but I got to spend some time with you…and I got to show off my best assets.”

“Your assets are… Beautiful.” I smiled at the memory of her nakedness, but the realization that she might be infatuated with me pulled me quickly back to the present.

“So are yours.” She said as she slid her hand around my back. I could feel my stomach gurgle in alarm as she did this, then she reached toward me with her face, eyes closed and mouth partly open, and awkwardly and reluctantly I stooped and kissed her as my stomach churned so loudly that I could audibly hear my body’s protestations.

I knew that if I had summarily rejected Melanie’s advance that she would have been insulted but I did not wish to encourage her. Amazingly, though, I found, as she forced her tongue between my teeth and tickled the tip of my own tongue, in the strange mixture of euphoric bliss and all consuming panic, a most titillating rapture, and I found myself, despite my utter reluctance, reciprocating her passionate oral embrace. She was after all a Beautiful young woman and soft and round in all of the right places. But I was thinking with the wrong brain, drawing from the previous night’s lustful exhilaration, and I came to realize this and I quite suddenly cut short our kiss.

“What’s the matter?” Melanie said with wide disappointed eyes, her hands still about my waist, as she settled back down onto the soles of her feet.

“It’s not you.” We were standing in the kitchen and I glanced back toward Sarah’s door which I noticed was still closed, “It’s a lot of things.” I whispered, “It’s Sarah, and it’s

Amber and it’s my whole screwed up situation. I mean… I’m wanted for murder. And if Amber finds out about us sleeping together, no matter what her marriage disposition, she might get upset. She might do something.” I drew a long breath as I thoughtfully searched for the safest way to explain my most ominous anxiety, “And then there’s Sarah.” I couldn’t tell Melanie too much. I had promised Sarah that I would keep her
act
a secret. “We had a sort of incident last night. She’s confused. This might make things even worse.”

“And then there’s us.” Melanie took my cup of coffee from my hand and she placed both of our cups on the table and she wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled my lips down to meet hers and we kissed a second time.

I broke off the kiss once again, “And then there’s the matter of your profession.” I thought myself so clever for bringing up this point.

“You don’t approve?” she smiled a drunken smile, as if this pleased her, “You’re the jealous type. Well I wouldn’t have thought
that
since you’ve been sleeping with a woman who still sleeps with her husband.” She raised her eyebrows accusingly.

“That’s different. It is what it is. I knew what I was getting into when I started and I can’t very well complain about it afterwards.” “Well then I’ll just have to give up my
profession.
” She tried her best to sound seductive with the way she elongated the pronunciation of the word
profession
but she slurred her S’s badly.

“You can’t afford to do that.”

“I’ve made a lot of money and I’ve saved it. I can get a regular job somewhere too.” She said confidently.

“Also, Amber’s coming over tonight.” “What a perfect time to break the news to her.” The alcohol made her brave, but I knew that in her gut she was dreading the confrontation that would ensue.

“I’m not sure that I have news to break. I think we need to give this some more time.”

Melanie dropped her hands to her hips and drooped her head as she closed her eyes as if holding back tears. She may have been freshened-up, but she was still feeling the effects of the alcohol. Perhaps she had counted on the alcohol to build her courage to come and see me and to say what she said. Perhaps she wanted to come early before the effects of the alcohol wore off and weakened her resolve. In any event I couldn’t let her cry so I pulled her to me and I loosely hugged her,

“I just mean that this all happened so suddenly and we need to handle things delicately. You’re right. Amber will never leave her husband. And you’re right; I do want more than she can offer me.” I felt as though I were playing a dramatic role in a bad movie, “And last night was wonderful, it really was. But we need to take it slow.” Melanie buried her head into my shoulder,

“We’re both still drunk. It’s not good to make decisions when you’re drunk. Why don’t we take a few days and think about this?”

“You’re right, of course.” She slid from my grasp and just stood in front of me covering her face with her hands. After an awkward minute of silence she turned and walked toward the door sniffling and staring at the floor.

But I wasn’t right. And I knew that I wasn’t right. Melanie was right. To Amber I was a piece of meat. Maybe that wasn’t the case at first…but our relationship had devolved into nothing more than a series of arranged physical encounters whereas I had really grown to care for Melanie deeply. She had taken us in, Sarah and I, no questions asked. She had cooked for us; she had behaved like a matron to Sarah and helped to fill the motherly void that the loss of Catherine had left; she had comforted me on many occasions, perhaps unknowingly, when Amber having forsaken my bed after completing the act had left me feeling sad and lonely; it was Melanie that I called and she who kept me company either by phone or by stopping by after her late evening engagements. Melanie had become the meaningful half of my affair with Amber. They, Amber and Melanie, had become two parts of the same relationship: Amber my lover and Melanie everything else. No wonder Melanie wanted the whole package.

And as Melanie opened the door to leave I knew that if I let her walk out, that I might not get another chance with her…that she might not feel the same way about me if I hesitated with her…much like the time I had fought Tony Artino; if I had chickened out on that fight we would probably never have been wed. As I saw it this fight was no different. I just needed to be brave.

“Wait, don’t go.”

Melanie turned and lilted her head and looked at me through tear moistened eyes.

“You’re right. I do want more.” I winced, holding back the gathering well in my eyes, “I want…you.”

Melanie turned and staggered back toward me and almost fell into my arms as though her legs had grown weary. She sniffled and leaned backwards and smiled at me, “Do you want to fool around again?” her eyes grinned up at me mischievously, and then she dabbed her little pink nose on a tissue and looked toward the bedroom.

“That could be a problem.” I led Melanie by the hand into the living room where we drank our coffee and talked until we were both too tired to keep our heads up. When

Melanie started to lilt I covered her with a blanket and I went to bed to try to get some rest. But of course all I could do was to contemplate the probable outcomes of the mess I had made. I never would have thought that

Melanie could have been so smitten with me after one brief physical encounter. But of course there was far more to our relationship than that. We had become close friends first, and we had played flirtatiously with one another during our veiled courtship.

But what was I thinking? Of course I wasn’t thinking at all or I never would have slept with Melanie. She was a mere child compared to me. And I was older and I was supposed to be more practical and level headed. What Melanie wanted was obviously out of the question. I certainly didn’t want to hurt her but I also knew that our timing was way off. And love; was that what
she
was immodestly professing? Did I love
her
? Platonically surely; but romantically? Was that what it was? I hadn’t really felt that way about anyone ever before, save Catherine. Was I capable of feeling romantic love for her so soon after Catherine’s death, I wondered? And now Melanie was willing to toss her best friend over the gangplank to be with the man she
thought
she loved. And I was left with no choice but to fight for my freedom with a foe fiercer in many ways than Tony Artino.

Amber was not a mere mortal. She was a lioness; a cat of prey. She had nails and sharp eye-teeth like the fangs of a feline. Her nature was possessive and her movements catlike. I could almost hear her hiss threateningly in defense of her kill. Only I was both the kill and the threat.