The Animal Hour (32 page)

“Stop.” Goddamn it. He ripped himself free of the sheets, stood naked off the bed. “The man's on drugs, that's all, that's what I saw. He needs some help, for Christ's sake. That's all. A little less of your airy-fairy bulbhit.”

“Oliver, don't you understand what …?”

“I mean, he wasn't taking that garbage before he met you, Tiffany.” He only muttered it, but her face went slack, as if he'd stunned her with a blow. He felt bad; it made him angrier still. “All that
—
cosmic crap. All that expand your mind, purify your aura, raise your astro-level. What'd you expect?”

“But I'm not the one
…”

“I mean, isn't this what you wanted? Isn't this what you wanted him to be like?”

She stared at him. Slowly, she shook her head. Her chin began to quiver. “God, Oliver! God, why are you being so mean to me?” Then her face buckled and she began to cry in earnest. “Oh God!” She flung herself back on the bed. Buried her face in her arms, sobbing. “You don't understand! You don't understand anything, Oliver, not anything. Just get out, damn it. Just get out of here. Please.”

Then he lost her. Right in the shadow of the library. He had looked up for only a second at the blackened patterns on its stained glass windows. He had thought, only for a second, about how he had planned to go up there tonight. Up to his workspace. To try to write a little, to watch the parade. And he had thought, without meaning to, without expecting to, without understanding why, he had thought suddenly that he could never go back. He could never write a poem again. He must keep silent. Must …

And when he looked down over the thick currents of people going to and fro in the gloaming, the blue baseball cap was gone. Tiffany was gone.

Perkins ran forward. Pushed forward through the crowd. He slid and shouldered his way up to the corner of West Twelfth. That's where she'd been standing. That's where he'd seen her last. He looked down the sidestreet. Along the brick facades, beneath the yellowing trees. Traffic had been stopped here too. People walked in the street, and along the sidewalk under street lamps and shadows. But there was no sign of Tiffany. Perkins stood there, looking for her, his heart pounding hard, his thoughts jumbling.

And then, with a little coppery spurt of fear on the back of his tongue, he realized this was Nana's block. There was Nana's building right in front of him. She must have gone in there. She must have gone up to see Nana …

He punched his fist into his palm as he charged forward again.

“Bitch!” he whispered. He started running. “The bitch!”

T
he building rose up over Nancy into the twilight sky. A broad brick facade with alabaster ledges and balconies. Shouldering the ledges, flanking the balconies, gargoyles stared out over Gramercy Park. They were grinning homunculi, squatting, gibbering. Wagging their tongues lasciviously. Rolling wild eyes.

Nancy stood on the sidewalk below them. She shivered, cold in her rags. Her eyes moved over the stone monsters overhead, over to the corner window,
her
window. It was dark up there. Nobody home. She gazed up at it until her vision blurred. She swayed where she stood. Faintly, behind her, she heard children's laughter. Two mothers were herding their costumed trick-or-treaters around the iron gates of the little park. Nancy listened to their voices wistfully. Closed her eyes. Feeling woozy again. And tired, so tired. If she could get upstairs, if she could get into her own home, onto her own bed … Oh, she would sleep for a year. The cool sheets around her body, the cool pillow under her head. The weight of her mother sitting at the foot of the mattress. Her mother singing.

She swayed backward. Nearly toppled over before she jacked her eyes open wide and steadied herself. She had to hold it together. She had to hang on if she was ever going to get inside.

The building was on the corner of Twenty-first and Lexington. The entrance was on Twenty-first, facing the park. The heavy wooden doors were open, but the doorman was there. A hard-looking Irishman. Face like a hammer, body like a fireplug. He was sitting on a three-legged stool just within the entrance. He had not moved for fifteen minutes.

Nancy lowered her eyes to him, blinking to stay awake. Maybe she should just walk up to him, she thought dreamily. Maybe she should just say, “Hi, I'm Nancy Kincaid. I was savagely murdered today and I'd really like to change my clothes. Are my folks home?”

Well, maybe not. If he didn't recognize her—if he called the police … She did not have the heart for that anymore. She did not have the energy to escape again. Most of all, she did not have anyplace else to go.

Anyway, the doorman was going to move soon. She was almost sure of it. He had to work the elevator too. She remembered that—or at least she thought she did. If she could just stay on her feet long enough, someone would ring for him upstairs. He would have to leave his post and go fetch them.

So she waited, swaying. She could almost feel the passing time. The dark falling all around her like rain. Getting late, she thought. Getting to be eight. Can't wait. Got a date. Got to be there for the Animal Hour, woo, woo. The flood of darkness closed around her. She could feel herself going under. Jesus, was it really only this morning that she had vanished from the face of the earth? All that running through subway tunnels, getting arrested, kneeing shrinks in the balls. Fighting with insane gunmen beneath the sidewalks. And then to realize that she was a murderer—and then to find out that she had
been
murdered—
I mean, what a day
, she thought. Her eyes fell shut again. She smiled, swaying comfortably on her feet. Feeling the goose pimples tickle her bare arms as the chill October dusk wove through the tatters of her blouse …

Then her eyes shot open. She had heard the bell inside: the elevator. She saw the doorman sigh and push off his stool to his feet. He shut the doors to the building. Through the doors' glass panels, through their filigreed glaze, she saw him humping away across the lobby. She waited another moment, breathing heavily. Then she looked around. The children were gone. Only a vampire and his girlfriend were strolling arm in arm by the park, pausing under the old iron street lamps. She moved toward the building.

At the door, through the glass, she could see the elevator across the way. The doorman had shut himself in the old-fashioned cage, and now the door slid shut and he rose out of sight. Quickly, Nancy hiked her skirt up. Reached into her panties and pulled out the .38. She struck the thick glass panel with the gun butt. Struck it again, down at the left-hand corner. A small triangle of glass burst from the pane. She heard it fall and shatter on the lobby floor. With another glance over her shoulder, she reached through the hole and seized the doorknob. In another moment, she was inside.

Imitation gas lamps burned low, threw yellow light on the dark oak paneling around the walls. Nancy's shadow danced on the marble tiles of the floor as she crept forward swiftly. She heard the elevator stop above somewhere. The arrow over the door pointed to the fourth floor. She heard the cage slide open. She went around the corner into a small mailroom.

Brass mailboxes lined three walls. On the fourth there was a solid metal door. Nancy pointed the gun at the doorknob. Her finger tightened on the trigger. On second thought, she reached out and tried the knob with her hand. The door opened easily. Inside there was a wooden pegboard with keys hanging from hook bolts. She lifted the key to 3K. Shut the door. Hurried back into the lobby.

She had not heard the elevator cage slide shut, but she could hear the car in motion now, descending. The arrow pointed to three, then two. Then light showed around the edges of the box. But Nancy had already crossed the lobby to the stairwell door. She pulled it open and slipped inside. As it shut behind her, she heard the elevator cage rattling open.

The adrenaline pumped through her and she climbed quickly. The rags of her blouse trailed behind her like white streamers. She gripped the key in her left hand, the gun in her right. On the third floor, she pushed the door open gingerly. She peeked out to make sure the hall was clear. Then she stepped into the hall, went with long strides toward the door at the end.

The hall lights were dim and she moved from shadow to shadow. The plush paisley carpet muffled her footsteps. She prayed that no one would open his door and spot her there. A beggar with a gun. This stench around her like a cloud.

When she reached 3K, she rang the doorbell. But she didn't wait for an answer. She unlocked the door with her key and went in. Shut the door behind her. She leaned back heavily against the wood. Her mouth hung open with weariness. She peered into the darkened foyer, seeing nothing but a blur. She brought her hand up quickly to brush tears from the corners of her eyes. Hi, Mom, she thought. I'm home.

It was several minutes before she could move away from the door. When she did, her heart was beating rapidly. She was eager—she had not known how eager she was—to see a familiar thing. Some room she had been in. Something she had touched. A face; her mother's face. Anything she remembered. The newsman's sonorous drone played in her head as she came through the small foyer. It taunted her:
The savage murder of Nancy Kincaid
… It was ridiculous. Obviously. She was not dead. It was crazy. And yet she was, in fact, beginning to feel like a ghost. Unseen. Unknown by anyone. She ached to exist again.

She moved into the living room, the gun held down at her side. She peered steadfastly into the shadows. She could make out an aging, respectable place. A thinning rug on a wooden floor. A stolid sofa. Stalwart club chairs that looked as if they would smell of pipe smoke. Nancy's eyes darted anxiously from one thing to another as she passed through. Butit allseemed two-dimensional in the dark. It did not seem real.
She
did not seem real moving through it. Her heart began to beat harder. With every step she took, she felt she was growing more ghostly, more transparent.
The savage murder … The savage murder of Nancy Kincaid …
Her head felt light. Christ, she was fading away, wasn't she? None of this was familiar. She could not remember it at all.

She crossed the room and came into a hallway. Doors opened on either side and there was one door at the far end. She moved down the corridor, peeking in the rooms. Looking at the pictures and photographs on the wall. Recognizing none of it.

The savage murder of Nancy Kincaid …

“Who am I then?” she whispered into the shadows. “Who the fuck am I?”

She felt like no one as she reached the end of the hall. She felt she was fading away.

Then she looked in through that last doorway. “Oh!” she whispered. She turned on the light.

It was her room. She had found her room. The lace curtains stirring over the partly opened windows. The Degas posters on the flowery walls. The ballerina jewel box on the white dresser, reflected in the mirror there. And snapshots wedged in the mirror's frame. The bed was a sweet four-poster with a frilled canopy over a thick white quilt. A huge stuffed panda was propped against the headboard. She moved among all this with her lips parted, her eyes swimming. Did she remember it? Was it hers? Well, wasn't it? Of course it was. She knew it was. A young woman's room that looked like a teenager's. That looked like a little girl's, in fact. Yes. That was just her. Because she hadn't wanted to grow up. Because she hadn't wanted to move away. She should have found her own apartment, her own job, a job she wanted, her own life … But she didn't care about that now. She tossed her gun down on the quilt. She took hold of one of the bedposts in her hands. She pressed against it. Rubbed her cheek against the warm curve of the wood. That was it for the outside world as far as she was concerned. She was going to live in this room for the rest of her life. Forever. She never wanted to leave. She closed her eyes and the tears overflowed them. Olly olly oxen free, she thought. Home.

It was a long while before she opened her eyes again. She gave a little laugh and sniffled. Looked around her. She let go of the bedpost and moved over to the dresser, to the mirror. She ran her eyes over the photos there. They were photos of girls mostly. Teenaged girls standing together, laughing. Arms thrown around each other's shoulders. Girls in evening gowns with boys in tuxedos beside them. Girls making faces, clowning in costumes and thrown-together outfits: the rich dame, the motorcycle bandit, the New Orleans whore. Her eyes moved from face to smiling face and she ached, she was so hungry, to remember any of them, one of them.

But there were only phrases. Words rising to the surface of her mind like bubbles in a pond.
Would you stop worrying? You look fantastic … Well, you ask
him
out. Guys love that … Lets just hit Columbus Avenue and shop until we die …
Phrases, words, but no voices. She just could not hear the voices. She could not remember them.