Tenderness (16 page)

The lie gave me shivers.

He said that the girl he walked into the woods with was not his girlfriend, that he had only just met her at the mall and was helping her find her lost wallet.

But I saw them holding hands and then he took her in his arms and kissed her, a deep long kiss, before they disappeared into the woods.

I didn’t mention the girl before because I was jealous, didn’t want to discuss another girl with him, didn’t want to know anything about her. But it just popped out of me, without warning, like a hiccup you don’t expect.

Nothing has been the same since.

He changed. Because he knows I caught him in a lie.

Now we are in the van again and it’s obvious that he doesn’t want to be seen with me. He told me to sit in the backseat, which makes me claustrophobic because there are no backseat windows. He has also stopped talking to me.

Since he told me it was time to go as we were feeding the swans, he has hardly said anything. He has not looked at me, either. He is almost hunched over the steering wheel and he keeps glancing in the side-view mirror as if he is trying to spot someone following us.

A minute ago, I asked him where we were going and he didn’t answer.

He is like two people in one body—the nice guy who bought me hot dogs and asked me about the scars on my wrists and the guy with cold eyes who is a stranger, like now at the steering wheel.

I am not only claustrophobic here in the backseat. I also feel trapped.

And I’m also scared.

He drove out of the park and onto the highway in a jumble of emotions, needing time to sort things out. He knew that he must eliminate the girl, cleverly, leaving no trail or clues behind. He must also get in touch with Maria Valdez, could feel the need growing in him, gnawing at him like a huge emptiness that must be filled as soon as possible.

Glancing in the side-view mirror, he saw only the normal flow of traffic behind him. He decided at last, finally, that he was not being followed and that he had not been followed since leaving Wickburg. All along, he had been alert to suspicious cars and had found none. There had been no police cruiser at the park, and it would have been impossible for any car, suspicious or otherwise, to drive into the park without being observed.

He looked into the backseat and saw the girl scrunched up, hugging herself like a little kid. Now that he had condemned her, he felt a rush of tenderness toward her, not the kind he’d found with the other girls or that he’d seek with Maria
Valdez but a different tenderness, wanting to be gentle with her. Her face, moist with perspiration, was a bit puffy under her eyes, showing the effects of the heat or maybe simply weariness from sleeping all cramped up in the van last night. He’d allowed her to freshen up in the single rest room at the pavilion, giving her two minutes to do the job, after checking to see if there was a rear entrance or a window through which she could escape. She’d been fresh faced and eager, eyes bright, when she came out. But as he glanced at her again, he caught a look of apprehension—or was it fear?—in her eyes, a shadow falling across her face. Maybe she suspected what was going to happen to her.

He had to take away any fear she might have, that might make her do something desperate and call attention to them.

He pulled to the side of the highway. “Why don’t you come into the front seat?” he said. “Sit beside me so we can talk.”

“Why did you put me here in the first place?” she asked, still suspicious.

“Okay—I was afraid we were being followed, that the police might think I’d kidnapped you. You’re just a kid, a runaway. I can’t afford to get into trouble.…”

Her face softened. She pushed a lock of hair
from her forehead. Opened the door and scrambled into the front seat. “Thank you. I was getting claustrophobic back there.” Touching his arm lightly, she said, “I’ll be quiet.”

“Just be yourself,” he said. “And I’ll try, too. Be patient with me. I’ve been locked up for three years. I get tense once in a while. I’m still trying to get back to normal.” He bestowed upon her his best smile, not faking it, wanting her to trust him, to take away her doubts.

“Okay,” she said, the brightness back in her eyes again, and he marveled at the power he had to affect her, like pushing buttons to make her happy or sad. Or afraid.

He pushed another button, touching her hand where it rested on her knee.

“It’s nice having you with me,” he said. And found that the words came easy to him.

His touch is like those small shocks of electricity you get when you walk on a thick carpet.

He draws his hand quickly away but his touch remains like an afterburn on my skin.

His smile is dazzling but more than that. There’s affection in it. Mr. Sinclair once said that
affection
is one of the most neglected words in the English language, that people throw the word
love
around like confetti when they mean
affection
. And that affection is a special feeling that you can have for a person.

But I think affection is also sad, especially when a person wants more than affection, wants love and can’t have it.

“Eric.” I love saying his name.

“What?” he asks, absently as usual, as if he is thinking of other things and has not actually heard me.

“I think my fixation is gone.”

“Good.” He turns slightly toward me, a half smile on his lips. Then back to the highway again.

“I think I’m falling in love with you instead.”

He does not answer. The car shoots forward, picking up speed.

“That’s not a smart thing to do,” he says, finally, speaking slowly, as if he has rehearsed the words in his mind. “How do you know what love is, anyway? You’re just a kid.…”

I move my body but I feel cheap doing it because my body doesn’t excite him. Or at least he pretends it doesn’t.

“I’m almost sixteen,” I reply. “And love’s got nothing to do with age. Romeo and Juliet. Juliet was fourteen. I never felt this way before. Well, maybe a little.” Thinking of Mr. Sinclair.

“With who?” he asks, but as if he’s humoring me, making conversation.

“A teacher, Mr. Sinclair.”

“Did he know you had this feeling for him?”

“Maybe, because he was afraid of me.”

“Why was he afraid of you?”

“Afraid he might get into trouble if he touched me, showed me how he felt.”

He doesn’t reply but keeps his eyes on the highway, still glancing in the rearview mirror once in a while.

We cruise along, the windows open, wind blowing my hair, talking once in a while, and even the silences are nice. I place my hand on his knee, and he allows it to remain there.

Turning off the highway, we drive through country roads, dappled with sunlight, gentle breezes coming into the car now and not stiff winds.

We drive into the center of a town whose name I don’t know and it doesn’t matter. As we slowly pass a bus terminal, I feel him stiffen beside me, actually feel him going rigid, his knuckles on the steering wheel turning white. He swivels into a parking space and is staring out my side window.

I follow his gaze and see her. She is tall, with long black hair flowing down her back, almost to her waist. She’s wearing a long brown paisley skirt and a white blouse. Her head is tilted as she looks in the window of a clothing store. The look in his eyes startles me, shocks me, in fact. Like glancing
into his soul, something raw and naked there, such longing in his eyes but even more than longing. Like a hunger. I think of those horror movies I’ve seen, where a man turns into a werewolf in front of your eyes, camera tricks, changing from a regular person to an animal, hairy, with claws, glittering eyes. Eric doesn’t turn into an animal, not hairy and no claws, but he has changed. The naked need in his eyes makes me shiver in the heat.

I take a deep breath.

“Why don’t you go and speak to her?” I hear myself saying.

He glances at me as if he had forgotten I am here.

“She’s beautiful,” I say. “She’s all by herself, alone. Maybe she’s lonesome.”

I hate myself for telling him this but I want him to be happy.

He shakes his head, more than once, twice, three times, as if he’s trying to shake off not only my words but something inside of him.

“Go ahead,” I urge. “Talk to her. It’s like she’s waiting for you.”

While I’m talking to him, I’m playing a trick with my mind, knowing what he might do if he goes to the girl, but not allowing myself to acknowledge what he might do, as if my mind is
splitting in two, half in the light and half in shadows. I know what that need in his eyes means, what he might have done to those other girls, but I also deny it at the same time: he’s only a regular guy who’s seen a good-looking girl on the street and wants to pick her up.

“I love you,” I say. “I want you to be happy. Go to her.”

He has one hand on the door handle and I think he is about to launch himself from the van when I say, “Wait.”

As we both look at her, the girl turns away from the store window, eyes bright with anticipation as a guy with a briefcase arrives wearing a beige summer suit. She greets him with a big smile as he bends to touch his lips briefly to her cheek.

Eric guns the engine, his foot slamming the accelerator, the smell of exhaust enveloping the van.

“Let’s go,” he says, his voice harsh and bitter.

And we go.

How much does she know?
he wondered as they headed toward the highway again, silence in the car, the girl looking out of her window.

They hadn’t spoken since they left the town behind. He didn’t know what to say to her. Afraid
of what he
might
say. She had urged him to pick up the girl. He’d heard the urgency in her voice, like she was cheering him on. As if she knew what he was going to do and didn’t care. She said she loved him—does love go that far?

Actually, he was relieved now that the guy with the briefcase had come along, taking away any decision he might have had to make. The situation had been filled with danger. Broad daylight and a strange town. The girl in the van practically a witness. Yet the need inside him had been so intense that he might have capitulated, might have made a disastrous error.

“I could use a shower,” the girl said, breaking the silence at last. “I feel all grimy.…”

Her face was innocent of deceit as he glanced at her.

His thoughts raced ahead. Seized a solution, a course of action. “We can stay at a motel tonight. You can shower all you want.” Then added, “Don’t worry—twin beds. Then we can find a nice restaurant.” He thought grimly:
like a prisoner’s last meal
. Then, sometime in the night, a quiet goodbye. Maybe with a pillow, quick and silent.

“Know what I feel like having?” she said, all eagerness. “A real turkey dinner, just like Thanksgiving.…”

“Too hot,” he said. “I thought girls like salads, stuff like that.…”

He was enjoying this stupid conversation about what to eat.

“That girl back there. She was so beautiful,” she said. “Dressed nice. Did you notice her outfit? I’d love to have clothes like that someday.…” Wistful, kind of sad.

“Why someday?” he asked. “Why not today?”

He felt reckless with generosity, knowing that he held this girl’s life in his hands, had the power to make her happy or sad.

For the moment, why not make her happy?

“We’ll find a good store in the next town,” he said. “We’ll go on a shopping spree.”

Everything in the store was black and white, from the stripes on the walls to the swirl of tiles on the floor.

The woman who came forward from the back of the store was attired entirely in black, which drew Eric’s eyes to the white streak in her hair.

“A dress,” the girl told her, her voice wispy and small.

The woman sized up the girl with eyes as impersonal as an X-ray technician’s. The girl glanced beseechingly at Eric: help me, her eyes pleaded.

Eric waved his hand extravagantly. “Get more than a dress,” he said. “Some sporty things, blouses …”

“Tops,” the clerk said, correcting him, taking him in at a glance, then dismissing him completely.

As the girl leafed through a rack of dresses, he was struck by the irony of the situation. She would never have the opportunity to wear the clothes to a dance or on a date. The purchases would be a waste of money, in fact. Yet he enjoyed the prospect of spending money on her.

The girl disappeared into a dressing room, two or three dresses over her arm, glancing back at him with a delighted smile. The clerk went to the window and looked out, ignoring him, glancing at her watch occasionally.

The girl flounced out of the dressing room, radiating bliss, the dress a dazzle of bright red-and-yellow flowers. Face flushed, eyes brilliant, she asked, “What do you think?”

He knew that it did not matter what he thought. It was obvious that she loved this garish dress she’d never wear.

“Beautiful,” he said. It did not cost him anything to say it. He displayed his old smile, charm and shyness, that always worked.

She also bought other stuff—two or three tops, a short beige skirt—too short, he thought, amazed at how her taste ran counter to his.