Skin and Bones (17 page)

Lard watched the whole scene, gripping the steering wheel so hard his fingers looked like swollen string cheese. He eased the Doodle into an empty spot in front of the hospital and honked the horn for no reason.

“Did you have to do that?” Bones asked.

Lard honked again. “Yeah.”

Bones stared at the stark white structure of the hospital, half expecting to see helicopters hovering, searchlights roaming, and a battalion of hospital police. Dr. Chu would be at the helm with an AK-47 and self-help bible.

Lard shouldered his door so hard it nearly flew off its hinges. He got out and headed across the lot without saying anything, lumbering sideways like he was playing football in slow motion.

Bones figured Lard would go to the kitchen to finish whatever he was supposed to have been doing. Gumbo had agreed to cover for him when he heard their outing involved culinary research.

Bones hurried to open Alice’s door. She got out in that way girls do, like their knees are fused together. Clutching the bag, she set off for the hospital with her magazine and its laxative-coated pages.

Bones wasn’t sure if he was supposed to follow her or what.

But of course he did…

A questionable looking sign hung on the elevator in a part of the hospital Bones hadn’t been in before, down a long corridor in a wing opposite the emergency room.
Out of Order. Please Use Stairs
. Not surprisingly the sign was stuck on with the same type of adhesive tape Alice used on her toes.

“I didn’t think we should take a chance with the stairs,” she said.

Bones nodded, his buzz fading.

She punched the call button and led him into an elevator long enough for a gurney. The doors closed, sealing them inside. It was uncomfortably muggy. Somewhere between L and 4 she pressed Stop.

Bones was confused, but Alice seemed to have a purpose.

She let the bag from the drugstore drop. It hit the floor with a thud, obviously holding more than a laxative-coated magazine. Alice moved closer to him, like she didn’t want the stainless steel walls to hear what she had to say.

They faced each other under the bright fluorescent light. It was so quiet he could hear his heartbeat. Then she reached out and touched his cheek, a soft tentative touch, and the world took a breath.

“Give me your hand,” she said, barely a whisper.

Bones held out his hand tentatively. She took it and placed it on her heart over her left breast. So small. So delicate. She didn’t move. He didn’t move. Alice was his life. How could he make her his eternal?

“Kiss me,” she said.

Bones let his hand linger, and then slowly slip away, not wanting her to think he was greedy. He touched her cheek, careful not to poke her in the eye. He wasn’t sure what to do with his other hand, so he put it in his pocket.
Classic move
.

He felt stupid for worrying about his breath, knowing it was gross from the wine—and he worried Alice was about find out how little he knew about kissing—and he wondered if she had condoms in the bag—and imagined himself unrolling one, all suave-like—and realized he was wasting the most amazing moment in his life—and wished his brain would just shut the fuck up.

Alice leaned forward. “
Now
.”

Bones shuddered. “Okay.”

He made small movements, taking her face in his hands like he’d seen in movies. He kissed the tip of her nose. He brushed his lips against hers, soft little butterfly kisses. Her lips were smooth and succulent. He closed his eyes, drinking in her essence. Cigarette smoke and wine and promise.

She touched his tongue with hers, and they were kissing, really kissing. Then somehow her tongue was probing his ear and his fingers moved to the slender curve of her waist.

“Kiss my neck. No, here. Harder. Yes.” Alice purred. “It’s okay to use your teeth.”

Bones nibbled.

Alice purred louder. “
Ummm
.”

Neither of them wanted to pull away.

His hand drifted slowly to her breast. This time she pressed into it. His fingers roamed to her other breast, while she traced the side of his neck with her tongue. He’d never felt anything like this. No words could describe it.

Her hand roamed down, down, down.

His heart beat fast, fast, fast.

And so loud he thought his ears would explode.

Then she touched him there.

God.

She began rubbing circles though his sweat pants and boxers. Softly. More circles. Then squeezing him. Gently, but firmly. Her hand wrapped around him. Steady tugs. Bones wouldn’t last another second like this. He hummed inside, little explosions of ecstasy, while he lost his innocence in a six-by-eight-foot compartment that wasn’t going up or down.

Alice must have leaned against the control panel, because suddenly the elevator lurched, and they stumbled off balance.

“If you get caught tell Chu Man you were outside looking for me,” she said when the doors opened.

Bones squinted, light flooding in. It was too stark. Too real.

“Tell him I was out front smoking,” she said. “And that I collapsed in the stairwell sneaking back in. Tell him they took me to the ER.”

Alice wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him full on the mouth—all tongue and wet warmth. “But give me a twenty-minute head start, okay?” she said, pulling back slightly.

All he could do was nod in utter bliss and stickiness.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

Bones found his way to the stairwell he usually used this time of day when sneaking back in from the roof. It was deserted as always. But it felt good to be alone with all that had just happened. He took each tread one at a time, not caring about how few calories he was burning.

For the first time in eons, he was truly happy—a happiness that swallowed him from his toes to his buzzed head. There was something about the rush of feelings when he’d kissed Alice and she’d kissed him back and her touching him in a way no one ever had. It all seemed so
right
, like everything real and honest.

Bones opened the door to the fourth floor and scoured the ward for Dr. Chu—his office, the dayroom, and the dining room. Usually Dr. Chu was everywhere at once. Now he was nowhere. Bones felt his nerves being stretched. Not because he was worried about getting busted himself; more because he felt compelled to deliver Alice’s message as promised.

Bones did the only thing he could think of. He wrote a note and slid it under Dr. Chu’s door. He went back to his room, wrapped his red M&M’s in toilet paper, and put them in a sock.

It was time to set up for dinner. He shoved the sock in the back of a drawer and rushed to the dining room.
We’ll be a couple tonight. Everyone on the ward will know because we’ll be holding hands during dinner, gazing into each other’s eyes
.

His brain went crazy with the things he’d be able to say to her in front of Teresa, Elsie, Mary-Jane, and the others. The TV had been left on again. An old episode of
Hell’s Kitchen
flickered in a mangle of overwrought emotions.
Now those guys need therapy
. He hurriedly set up the tables.

A commercial propagated the dangers of leaving dogs unattended in hot cars—the Valley would cool off later in the week, the forecaster said, down to 101 degrees, though the coast could continue to expect a heavy marine layer.

Bones looked up when Teresa came in. Her eyes were as swollen as the first day he saw her. It looked like she’d been grinding them with salt after an eyewash of pickled beet juice.

She stared at him accusingly, as if she’d caught him pilfering Lucky Charms from the kitchen. “Where’ve you guys been?” she asked.

Bones shrugged, knowing what she was talking about; he just didn’t know how to answer. He stammered, trying to think of something that would be believable. He wasn’t coming up with anything.

“Uh, handling an urgent situation,” he finally said.

Teresa stood in the middle of the room, slumped. Air wouldn’t hold her up much longer. She looked like someone had cut out her heart and pummeled it with a frying pan. And that’s pretty much what had happened. “Did I do something wrong…I mean, is Lard mad at me?”

How could he tell her the truth? Without making her feel worse? That Alice had planned an outing that turned into the best day of his life?

“It was sort of last minute,” he said, sounding like the dirty rotten liar he was. “But Lard isn’t mad at you—I’m sure of that.”

Teresa took a few steps backward, bumping a wooden chair, sitting down so hard he expected splinters. “Sometimes I feel like that blue hippo on the cartoon channel. You know the one I mean?”

“Come on, Teresa.”

“If I tried to walk on water I’d sink,” she said. “I have stubby hippo legs and beady hippo eyes.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I know people stare at me.” Her face sank into her hands, making it hard to hear her. “Sometimes I pretend I’m already the perfect weight so I can stop being overwhelmed by what I should and shouldn’t eat.”

“I’ve spent most of my life comparing myself to others,” Bones said sitting down beside her. “But what’s the point? Someone will always be more confident. Smarter, wittier.”

“Tanner.”

“Exactly.”

“I can still fit into the earrings I wore in kindergarten,” she said, smiling.

Bones knew what he had to say—it was long overdue. “I’m sorry for not being friendly when I first got here. I was such a jerk.”

Then he shrugged.

Teresa shrugged too.

And they both sort of laughed.

This was the longest conversation they’d had one-on-one.

“You wouldn’t believe what I used to think about you,” she said.

That didn’t surprise him. He’d heard it all. Some nights he and Lard talked about the girls like regular guys. Another way to fry time.

“You sure Lard isn’t mad at me?” she asked again.

Bones shook his head. “He likes you a lot.”

They were quiet awhile.

Teresa picked at her nail polish and watched it flake. Then Nancy appeared with tablecloths, ugly plaid with frayed edges. Bones watched her, thinking she moved too efficiently and without her usual chitchat. He knew something was up—it came from years of experience with shrinks.

When Alice didn’t show up for dinner Bones figured she’d gotten busted. He kicked himself for leaving the note, because if she hadn’t gotten caught sneaking back into the ward, she sure as hell would have been after Dr. Chu read it. He could only imagine what type of punishment he’d dish up.

“What’s the matter?” Teresa asked him.

Bones shrugged, worrying about Alice. It wasn’t the first time he’d had to force himself to go through the motions of pretending nothing was wrong.

The first thing Bones noticed after crawling into bed after being away from the hospital was the hypoallergenic wintergreen air freshener that had probably never been used in experiments on rats, otherwise it wouldn’t have been allowed in institutions that housed human beings.

He lay there in his boxers feeling like he knew where he was in relationship to Alice even when they weren’t together. He felt warm in all the places she’d touched him. And even though they didn’t go all the way, what they did together, what she did to him, had all the elements to it. Excitement and a secret connection with Alice.

“Teresa’s pissed,” Lard said from his bed. “I don’t blame her.”

“Nah, she’s more hurt than mad.”

“I like her, man,” Lard said quietly. “Sure she’s a little emotional sometimes, and she has a substantial butt, but hey, we all have our quirks. I really think she’s the one. And she feels the same way about me, at least she did until today. That’s a first, man, usually it’s one-sided. I fucked up.
Bad
.”

Bones felt crappy all over again.

“I’m not gonna be one of those jerks who falls asleep after the act,” Lard said. “While my girlfriend strokes my forehead worrying that the condom leaked and she’s gonna have to raise an army of little Lards.”

“You think we’ll ever be smart about women?” Bones asked.

“I think we’ll always be like this—even when we’re thirty.”

“Sad, huh?”

“Alice must’ve gotten nabbed,” Lard said.

Bones breathed into the stale air. “I feel guilty that she got caught and we didn’t.”

“Not me.”

Suddenly Bones was back in the elevator with Alice. This time they were both naked. She was licking her lips hungrily while he fed her peanut M&M’s from the bag. He let her feed him one—remembering how good they tasted, realizing he must be some kind of freak, because he was getting
hard
all over again.

Bones and Lard were jolted awake sometime before dawn by overhead lights and a maniac in a two-piece jogging suit with turquoise piping. “Get up,” Dr. Chu told them.

Bones sat up too fast, nearly falling out of bed. The room was too fluorescent. The voice too loud and authorial.

“Where is she?” Dr. Chu asked.

Bones squinted at him, his heart thudding.

Lard rubbed his eyes. “Who?”

“Don’t feed me that crap, Mr. Kowlesky. I know the three of you took off yesterday—and we’ll deal with that later, believe me—but Alice never came back and you can’t tell me you don’t know where she went.”

Lard’s hair looked like greased crow feathers. “Huh?”

Dr. Chu stood between their beds, his stare heating up the room. He was about to fry them up for breakfast. Pigs in a blanket. “Let me restate this,” he said. “Alice came back to the ward but only to clean out her room.”

Bones wondered if he was dreaming. Usually when he asked himself that question he woke up.

“As of five minutes ago—exactly five forty-eight a.m.—she hadn’t shown up at home either. That means she’s been missing for fourteen hours. Her parents have called the police. I expect them here anytime.”

Dr. Chu’s words were little blowtorches. Bones swallowed hard, choking on ash. He couldn’t wrap his brain around it. This couldn’t be happening, wasn’t supposed to happen. Just last night they were in the elevator.
Alone
. They’d kissed, really kissed—tongues and hot breath. They’d touched. She’d touched him
there
.