Shadows and Lies (12 page)

Eventually, I called a tow truck, and he towed me and my car to Sean’s tire store, where Julio did indeed take good care of me. Still, four new tires didn’t come free, and I winced as I slid my credit card through the machine and signed my name on the receipt. I waited for more than an hour for the tires to be installed while workmen came and went, all of them casting curious glances at the “Faggot Loving Whore”. Then, feeling extremely self-conscious, I drove my ugly car to Sean’s paint place and forked over another large sum to have it be painted and the windows cleaned. I was told that my car would be ready by the next afternoon.

It was 3 o’clock by then and I felt hungry and tired and empty. Having no other recourse, I took the bus home. Calling anyone and having to put up with conversation and explanations was not something I wanted to deal with at that time. What I did want was to ignore the outside world for a while and just sleep, especially since I’d not gotten much the night before. I dozed on the bus, and it took me two hours to get home. Sean wasn’t home yet, so I left a message on Sean’s home phone saying that I was too tired for dinner tonight and could we move it to tomorrow? Then I crashed face first onto my bed and slept until about 10 o’clock.

I opened my eyes drowsily as I tried to figure out what had woken me up. Pounding, I realized. Someone was pounding on my door. Scared and not knowing who could possibly be outside, I rolled out of bed and groped for my stun gun which I always kept on my bedside table while I slept. I stumbled to my door and looked out the peep hole.

“Carrie!” a man hollered. “Carrie! You quit hiding from me and get out here! I know you’re home! I got something to say to you!”

It was Dan Doherty.

“Carrie! Open your door!” he yelled, beating his fists against it again.

I stood back. There was no way on earth I was going to open my door to that maniac. But what should I do? I froze for a second, then grabbed my cell phone and dialed 911.

“911,” said a female voice. “What is the nature of your emergency?”

“There’s a guy outside my door yelling and beating on it. He wants me to come outside!” I said urgently, watching Dan through the peep hole.

“Do not go outside or open the door to him!” the operator told me quickly. “What’s your name and address?”

I told her and she dispatched the police. “Do you know this man?” she asked me.

“I can hear you on the phone, Carrie! Don’t make me break your window to get at you!” Dan yelled.

“Oh my God!” I cried out. “He’s going to break my window!”

“Calm down!” said the operator. “Tell me your address.”

I did. “The police are on their way,” she reassured me. “Is there a secure room you can go to that has lock?”

“No! I live in an upstairs studio apartment! There’s nowhere for me to go!”

I saw Dan’s shadow in front of my window, and just when I was sure that he was going to put a foot through it, the loudest car horn I’d ever heard went off. I jumped in fear. “What now?” I cried.

“Hey! What are you doing pounding on that door like that?”

I recognized that voice. It was Sean. He apparently hadn’t made it home till just then.

“Mind your own business, buddy!” Dan called back.

“I am minding my own business,” Sean said casually as he came quickly up the stairs. He was still in his work clothes, I saw. “The woman who lives behind that door is my business.”

“What’s going on?” the operator asked me. “Are you alright?”

“Yes,” I answered, gripping my phone as I watched Dan mouth off at Sean once more. “My b-my neighbor has come home and is warning Dan away.”

“The police should be there in moments, Carrie. Whatever happens between your neighbor and Dan, don’t go outside!”

It was hard to obey her though. Dan was in a rage, making good on his threat to make me sorry for dumping him. He was clearly out of control, and I wondered what he would do to Sean.

“Back away from the door,” Sean ordered Dan, his voice menacing. “I don’t care what’s gotten you so mad, but if you don’t do as I say, I will hurt you.”

Dan stood before Sean in his khakis and button up dress shirt, red in the face and heaving for breath. Sean was dirty and smudged, his tattoos on his arms showing, his bald head glowing in the porch light. He looked like a thug and I hoped that would be enough to scare Dan off.

For a moment, Dan seemed to waver, unsure about the man who was now only a few feet from him on the landing. In the distance though, I could hear police sirens, and it apparently hit Dan that he was about to be arrested. I don’t know if he figured that he had no choice or if he wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, but he hollered, put his head down, and charged Sean like a bull.

I gasped in fear for Sean, but there wasn’t any reason to be afraid. Sean sidestepped him and Dan hit the railing. He stumbled and almost fell, but whirled around to face Sean almost immediately. He swung a fist to hit Sean, but Sean blocked the blow with his arm. His own fist connected with Dan’s nose, and Dan crumpled to the ground in a coughing, bloody mess just as the police zoomed into the parking lot. Immediately, Sean stepped away from Dan, put his hands up and faced the apartment wall. He knew the routine, I realized.

Of course. He used to be a professional criminal.

“What’s going on?” the operator asked. I had forgotten all about her. “The police are here, and Dan in on the ground,” I said distractedly.

“Alright, then I’m going to hang up now. Good luck there, Carrie.”

“Thank you. Bye.”

I threw my phone on the floor and unlocked my door. Sean eyed me as I rushed to his side, but he didn’t move from his position on the wall. “Thank you,” I whispered, but he just grunted at me in reply. The police were coming up the stairs with their guns drawn, yelling for Dan to get down as he was struggling to get up. I stepped closer to Sean at the sight of their guns.

The officers immediately cuffed Dan, but I had to explain to them who Sean was because they wanted to put him in cuffs too. Sean was allowed to go free while Dan was hauled moaning and dripping to the patrol car. For the second time in one day, I found myself filling out a police report.

The responding officers were the same ones who had come when Charles and Glen’s cars had been vandalized, and they remembered us as well. Dan was now a suspect in those crimes the officers explained after everything was sorted out and they had taken care of all the paperwork.

According to his explanation, Dan was upset over the fact that police had come and spoken to him while he was at work about the vandalism of my car. Humiliated by me for the last time, he had downed a few drinks and decided that he wanted some payback.

“I didn’t realize that he was such an unstable person,” I told to Sean as the police drove away.

“I didn’t realize you’d gone out with him,” Sean growled.

We were still standing out on the balcony. Neighbors were peeking out windows, having a look at the local troublemakers no doubt. It was annoying being watched, but they had served the purpose of being witnesses to the fact that Sean had come to my defense, and not been in cahoots with Dan. Now I just wanted to get away from our audience and talk to Sean, who looked pissed and jealous.

I grabbed his hand and pulled him into my apartment, and locked the door behind me. I turned around and gasped. Sean stood only inches from me; I hadn’t expected him to be so close. He put his hands on my upper arms and I thought for moment that he was going to shake me. He didn’t though. He just held me in place, as if afraid I might run away.

“When did you go out with that jerk?’ he demanded to know. He was so intimidating. I squared my shoulders and refused to be intimidated.

“I went out with Dan once two days after the shower,” I explained, jerking out of his grasp. “That was before you kissed me. And it wasn’t even a real date. We saw a movie together at the library and had some coffee afterwards. I came straight home because he was a loser. That was when Charles and Glen’s cars got vandalized, remember?”

“Yeah,” Sean said, still not looking happy with me.

“There’s no reason for you to be jealous,” I continued, knowing that I was telling the truth and wanting desperately for him to believe me. “Dan got mad at me the next day after I told him for the second time that I didn’t want to see him again. Nothing sneaky has been going on between us.” I took a deep breath. “I’m not two-timing you.”

He believed me. I knew it because his angry expression melted. It was replaced by a haunted look in his eyes, and he grabbed my arms again, pulling me to him in a crushing embrace. He was trembling ever so slightly.

“Jesus, Carrie,” he said, his words muffled because his face was buried in my hair. “I was scared to death. I still am. I don’t know what I would have done to that guy if he’d actually gotten his hands on you.”

I shuddered at the thought too. “I didn’t know what to do,” I said in a small voice. “I didn’t like the fact that I had no way to escape.”

“Maybe you should think about moving out of here,” he suggested even as he pulled me closer.

“I’m in the middle of my lease. And you’re crushing my ribs.”

Sean loosened his grip just enough so that I could raise my arms up and loop them around his neck. He pulled me against him once more, but his grip was more intimate now rather than desperate.

He tucked my head under his chin, a position that felt oddly wonderful to me. “Every time I turn around you’re getting into trouble. What am I going to do with you?” he asked.

I stroked Sean’s back and suddenly wished that he was wearing a T-shirt so I could slip my hands underneath it and feel his skin. Whoa, I thought. Down girl. Still, I couldn’t help but suggest, “You could kiss me?”

Sean obliged, kissing me roughly at first, then more gently but still hungrily. It was the kind of kiss that could lead into all sorts of mischief, and I thought at that moment that I was totally ready for some.

But Sean wasn’t. He pulled his mouth from mine and heaved a sigh and tucked my head back under his chin. “I think I gotta’ home now.”

“Alright,” I whispered.

“I’ll see you tomorrow for sure?” he asked me.

I nodded, and then asked, “Did you get my message?”

“I did.”

I moved so that I could look him in the eyes. He had such beautiful eyes. “Where were you that you got home so late?”

Sean hesitated. “A buddy of mine called. He needed to talk. He’s been having some problems.”

“Oh,” I said. “That was nice of you.”

I told Sean goodnight, but I wondered about this friend of his. I didn’t have any beef with him helping a friend out in a crisis, but I did wonder why he seemed so uncomfortable talking about it. Was he lying?

I shook my head. Nah.

Understandably, I ended up tossing and turning all night, thinking about Sean, thinking about Dan. I had a horrible nightmare that my alarm clock saved me from that involved Dan, a knife, and a bottomless swimming pool. Bleary eyed, I took the bus to work and was inundated by questions from my nosy coworkers. Dan was not there, and when I asked, I was told that he had been fired. The two security guards who were permanent fixtures at the library since 9/11 were on the lookout for him should he be let out of jail on bail and decide to show up there.

I called Genny on my lunch break to let her know that she had been right about Dan being not worth my time. “Sean’s taking me out on a date tonight,” I finished, knowing that she’d not lecture me about my poor choice in Dan with news like that to chew on.

Predictably, she squealed and clapped her hands, which made me laugh because just saying with that I was “with” Sean made me happy too. He was a gentleman despite his background.

“He’ll be so good for you, I just know it,” Genny assured me when she was done congratulating herself on a match well made. “Isaac speaks so highly of him.”

“He is a good guy,” I agreed.

“I hope you won’t take this amiss, but I wanted to make sure you picked a good guy to be your first love and not some sleaze ball who treated you like trash. I was worried you’d do that, considering how you were raised.”

I sat up straighter in my seat. “What do you mean by that?”

Genny said slowly and tactfully, “Well, studies have shown that girls who are raised to think that they’re worthless generally pick guys who treat them like they’re worthless because they don’t think they deserve any better. Or that they can get any better. Those kinds of girls tend to end up in abusive relationship after abusive relationship. I didn’t want you to end up with some guy who hit you. I didn’t want to see you stay with some guy who hit you.”

I frowned. “I don’t think I would stay with a guy who treated me badly,” I said, thinking of how I hadn’t stuck around home, nor had I gone back. “And if a guy ever hit me, I sure as heck wouldn’t stick around.” I’d wait till he was asleep, tie him to the bed, and break all his bones with a baseball bat. Then I’d leave him.

“I hope so,” Genny said. “But I worry because…Well, never mind. As long as you’re with Sean, I don’t have to worry.”

“No,” I said. “Tell me what you were going to say. You’ve got me curious.”

“I don’t want to risk insulting you.”

“You won’t insult me,” I pressed her. “Come on; tell me what you were going to say.”

Genny sighed. “Okay. I was going to say I worried about something like that happening because you stick close to your parents.”

My mouth hung up open in shock at her words. “I’m not close to my parents,” I said defensively. “When was the last time you ever saw us be ‘close’?”

“I didn’t say you were close, I said you stick close to them. You know they’re abusive; they treat you badly, especially Nancy, but you take their phone calls and you go over and help around the house and visit and keep up the lines of communication.”

“I just want to be a dutiful daughter,” I said quietly.

“I know, and that would be good under healthy circumstances, but Carrie, your parents are toxic, and they still have a huge influence over you. And that worries me. Sometimes I just want to tell you to move away out of state and not give them your new number, not contact them anymore, because all they do is tear you down and make you feel like you’re worthless, like nothing you do is right or good. I mean, your mother called you a whore for saying something nice about a neighbor on the news. Don’t tell me that kind of thing doesn’t affect you.”