Whisper to Me (19 page)

Later she looked at her watch. “Your dad gets back at seven, right?”

“Usually.”

“Okay, I’d better split.” She walked to the door, and I opened it for her.

“See you,” I said.

She smiled. “Not if I see you first.”

“What does that mean?”

A frown. “Actually,” she said, “I don’t really know. I just say stuff sometimes.” A pause. “Speaking of. I didn’t see any photos of your mom in the house. What happened to her, Cass?”

(
Why does everything you touch have to turn to—
)

That wasn’t the voice, just to be clear; that was Dad’s voice, in my head.

“Nothing,” I said.

Paris looked at me. “Nothing happened to her.”

“No,” I said.

She raised her hands. “Okay. Okay. Leaving it.” She turned and started across the yard. “Oh, Cass!” she exclaimed. “You lucky girl.”

“Huh?”

“Bare abs. Just
lying around
.”

I followed her out. She strode to the street, still giggling. Asleep on the lawn, next to a couple of open cans of Bud, was Shane. He had taken his top off—I guess because it was hot and he wanted to sunbathe a little. Then he’d obviously fallen asleep. He was wearing loose red lifeguard shorts. I could see the ridges of his stomach muscles.

Paris was gone; there was just me standing there, and Shane lying on the ground like a Greek statue lain out in the grass.

“Look away,” said the voice.

But I kept looking. I was fascinated—I’d seen boys’ bodies on the beach, but never one this close. I mean, apart from my dad, and he didn’t count. I couldn’t turn away from that hard chest, the V that ran down from his—

“You’re enjoying this,” said the voice. “Stop it, or I will punish you.”

“After six p.m.,” I said automatically. “No talking before six p.m.”

“Look away, now. Or you will pay.”

I didn’t look away. I know I should have. Aside from anything else, it felt like a betrayal, of you. That sounds stupid. I mean all we had done was drive on the beach and talk a couple of times. But that’s how it felt. Sometimes the things we feel are not rational.

Often, in fact.

Then Shane stirred. He kind of snuffled and said a name—Linda—I still don’t know why—and rolled to the side a little. I thought,
Oh no, he’s going to wake up and see me looking
. I couldn’t move; I was stuck there like a woman turned to stone.

But then something worse happened.

As Shane turned, his hand went down and … well … scratched his crotch. Not in any sexual way, just a guy, asleep, shifting
stuff
around or whatever. And because he was wearing those baggy lifeguard shorts I saw his … junk.

I literally could not look away. I wasn’t titillated or anything, I was horrified.

Oh my God
, I thought. I felt sick.

I guess I should have found it funny. But I didn’t find it funny at all. I just felt nauseous and appalled, and one thought went through my mind, the one that didn’t help at all with challenging the voice’s power:

The voice did this. It told me to look away or it would punish me, and then when I didn’t look away it made me see … this.

Finally I managed to make my legs work, and I turned and went back into the house. I knew the Doc would say that the voice had nothing to do with it, that it was just coincidence, but I didn’t really
believe
it. I was remembering how it had made me stab my finger on the compasses at school.

I was still afraid.

But I’m not afraid anymore, I’m not afraid of anything. Not of the voice, not of my dad, nothing.

Come to the pier on Friday, and I’ll show you.

Things were so much better with the voice, but it still had power. It was still the one in control.

I was leaving the house to go hang with Paris at her condo. I went to grab my keys from the monkey butler. He was a wooden monkey in a red jacket with a fez, balancing a platter that would hold my keys, Dad’s, his car keys too. I don’t know why we had a monkey. Mom and Dad got him from an antique store in Cape May when I was little, or something.

Anyway, I reached out for the keys and the voice said:

“No.”

“Hi!” I said. “How are you?”

“Leave the keys.”

“I’d really prefer if you only spoke to me aft—”

“It’s six fifteen p.m.,” said the voice.

I looked at my watch. Oh.

“Leave the keys,” the voice repeated.

“It’s a latch bolt,” I said. “It automatically locks when the door closes. I won’t be able to get back in.”

“That’s the point, yes,” said the voice.

“But
why
?” Something about the voice made me sound like a whining teenager. I hated that.

“You only brushed your teeth once this morning. And you didn’t wash your face. What is it, do you
want
to be revolting?”

“No.”

“Good. Maybe being locked out will make you think about these things.”

I withdrew my hand, leaving the keys where they were. I would have to hope Dad was home not too late, though he’d said he wouldn’t be back for dinner—that was why I was going to Paris’s place to begin with. He’d be pissed with me for staying out at night—not that I had a formal curfew, but he didn’t like me being out in the dark with the killer around—but what could I do?

I opened the door.

“Wait,” said the voice. “Put on a jacket. You look like ****.”

I went to the closet.

“No! Not that one! What are you, color blind?”

“Better?” I asked.

“Satisfactory,” said the voice.

As I passed the monkey, I pushed my luck—I reached out my hand, thinking the voice might not be paying attention.

“You want to bleed tonight?” asked the voice.

I went out without my keys.

When I got to Paris’s apartment building, I pressed the bell and heard the buzz that said the door was unlocked. I went in and rode up in the elevator to the second floor. As I neared her door, a guy in a dark suit came out—he was in his forties maybe? I glanced at his hand—there was a gold wedding ring on his ring finger.

He lowered his eyes as he passed me and hurried into the elevator. He had a belly that was stretching his white shirt, although the rest of him was skinny.

Paris was holding the door open and she looked—and if you’d told me I’d ever see this I wouldn’t have believed you—she looked
embarrassed
. Or more than that, ashamed.

I didn’t say anything—what could I say? I just smiled at her and she smiled back, and we went inside.

“Let’s go to the piers,” said Paris.

“What?”

“Let’s do it. Ride the Ferris wheel.”

“You’re kidding?”

“No. Why?”

“I’m
town
. People from the town don’t go to the piers.”

“Oh please,” said Paris. “Like you didn’t go when you were a kid.”

“That was different. I was a kid.”

She shook her head sadly. She had eyeliner ticking up from the corner of each eye, bright blue; it made her look like a cat. Pin-striped pants, high heels, a shirt. Big bangles on her wrists, in all colors. She grabbed a half-full bottle of Smirnoff from the counter. “Anyway, I’m not town,” she said. “I’m from New York. I’m a tourist basically. A student tourist. I’m everything you town people hate. So we’re going,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do about it.”

Story of my life.

I’ve just noticed that I called the bottle of vodka “half full.” Whereas I told you that my dad is a glass-half-empty kind of guy.

That must make me an optimist.

Well, I guess I wouldn’t be writing this otherwise.

Paris, of course, was right; we had fun.

The sun was setting over the town as we got to the end of the street by her building. We climbed up the steps onto the boardwalk, joining it just between the
SLOT MACHINE ARCADIA
, which is decorated with spray-painted murals of satyrs and nymphs frolicking in a dell by a stream, and
VINNIE’S TATTOO STUDIO
.

“You want?” said Paris, holding out the bottle of vodka.

I shook my head.

“Killjoy,” said Paris.

“My allergy,” I said.

“There are no peanuts in vodka, Cass.”

“No.”

“So have some.”

“I can’t.”

She stopped, took another swig, and looked at the bottle, then at me. “You did before we went to the group.”

“Yeah, because I was nervous. But it was only that one time. I don’t drink.”

Paris puzzled was a beautiful thing to see. It was not something that happened a lot. Her eyebrows stayed knitted. “Why not?” she asked.

“It’s if I
do
eat peanuts. Or something with peanuts in it. Alcohol makes an anaphylaxis much worse.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Seventeen to twenty-seven. That’s the danger zone. When most allergic people die. Because they drink and get sloppy, and then they get a reaction and their bodies are already weak from the booze.”

“Huh. Who’d have thought it.” She took a swig of vodka and threw the bottle, still nearly half full, into a trash can—laid it up like a basketball player, hand curled over, the bottle flying in a perfect parabola before landing with a
chink
. Then we crossed the wide wooden walkway, skirting kids carrying cotton candy, and laughing groups of teenagers. Balloons in a hundred colors rose from the wrists of toddlers, like sky-jellyfish.

Then we were across the boardwalk, and in the amusement park.

We went to a booth and bought evening tickets—they gave us blue wristbands with the moon printed on them. Already the sun was low in the sky over the town, painting the rooftops orange. We were just paying the teller—a young girl working for the summer, I guessed—when a guy at the back of the booth came over and looked at me through the glass.

“Cassandra?” he said.

I nodded.

He came out a door in the side of the booth. Russian Pete, I think he was called? Short, always wore a bow tie, had eyes that puffed out, fishlike. He did a kind of measuring motion with his hands. “Jeez, you got big.” He called over his shoulder. “Hey, Finn.”

There was a guy in a dolphin suit just behind the booth—the Piers mascot. He ambled over and stood in front of Russian Pete. Then he took off his head. “’S’up, Pete?”

“See that?” said Pete. “That’s Mike’s girl.”

“Cassandra?”

“Yep.”

The mascot named Finn took another couple of steps forward. He leaned down. It was weird being leaned down to by a guy in a dolphin costume. His hair was all mussed from the big foam head, and there was sweat on his forehead. I recognized him—he had been a regular at the restaurant. Finny McCool, the guys called him. I had no idea why.

“You got big,” he said slowly. He had a big, round face. Finny was kind of a simple guy.

“She sure did, didn’t she?” Pete turned to me. “His name’s Finn, and he wears the dolphin costume. Finn. Kills me every time.”

“Huh?” said Finn.

“Never mind,” said Pete. “Go thrill the kids with your impression of a sea mammal.”

“Huh?”

“Go be a dolphin.”

“Oh. Okay.” He turned around, putting his head back on. I could see the sweat beading at his neck. I felt sorry for him. Even though it was evening it must have been seventy degrees, easy, and that dolphin costume had to be seriously hot. Dad always said it was the worst job on the pier.

Paris was watching all this like she’d been dropped into another reality. “How’ve you been?” said Pete to me. “I haven’t seen you since … ah …” He swallowed. I saw the panic enter his eyes, saw him add it up. “Since …”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Pete, sadly. I always liked Pete. He told stupid jokes and he did lame tricks, but he was sweet, you know? Then he brightened. “You paid!” he said. “Only out-of-towners pay.”

I shrugged.

Pete sighed. “Let’s see what we can do about that.” He reached behind my ear, and I thought he was going to pull out the twenty bucks we had paid, but he didn’t. He frowned. “Hmm. Not there. Check your pocket.”

I reached into my jeans. There was a shape in there like a cigar—two ten-dollar bills rolled up. “Hey,” I said, genuinely impressed. “Your tricks got better.”

“You’re older now,” said Pete. “Got to up my game.”

“Seriously, though, we can pay,” I said.

Pete looked at us both. “You girls like popcorn, right? Dippin’ Dots?”

“Yeah,” said Paris, smiling.

“See,” said Pete to me. “Your girl is with me on this. Take the twenty, use it on the concessions. The rides are free. I absolutely insist. If you say no you will be insulting not only me but also the entire Piers staff, present, past, and future.”

“Okay,” I said, putting my hands up in a gesture of surrender. “Thanks, Pete.”

“You’re welcome.”

Then he raised a hand, like,
hang on
. He went into the little booth and came back out with two lanyards with VIP cards on them. “Wear these,” he said. “Skip the lines—the guys will let you on the rides first.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Go.”

“Thank you, Pete,” said Paris.

“Thank
you
,” said Pete. “It’s good to see our girl with a friend.”

Jesus, Pete
, I thought.
Way to make me sound like a loser.

But Paris smiled. “She’s special, this one,” she said.

“She sure is,” said Pete. He waved us toward the park. “Go, have fun.”

And we did.

We went to the Accelerator first. It’s the oldest and biggest wooden roller coaster in the United States. Did you know that? It doesn’t loop the loop or go upside down or any of that stuff. But it’s still a rush. You get on it and the chain pulls your car up

up

up

up

into the twilit sky. You see the ocean, all the way to the horizon, stretching out, shining in the red light of dusk. The city on the other side, a million points of light. You hear laughter and shouting, carrying over the clear evening air. Then there’s a moment where you’re teetering, in equilibrium, and then you
tip
, and you rush down … so fast that it feels like you’re merging with the wind.

And then
whoosh
, up again, and down, and up, and all the time screaming.