Ghost Light (25 page)

“Somewhere… I … know… in … the… deep dark… night…”

God, this HAS to be a dream!
she thought frantically.
Please let me wake up now!

Krissy was only five years old, but she knew that it was impossible to fly. That was something only Peter Pan could do in the cartoon her aunt had rented for her last week. But that didn’t dispel the dizzying sensation that she had drifted out her bedroom window and was suspended high above the ground, looking down at the sleeping city. Her eyes filled with tears that made every pinpoint of light sparkle like a jewel. Reds, greens, blues, and yellows all shattered into bright, watery circles. Looking down from the moon to the street in front of the apartment building, she noticed several cars that were parked along the curbside. Straight down below the moon, caught in the dark, angled slash of shadow cast by the church, she saw a pale white van. It glowed in the night with an eerie greenish-white, looking like that scary “Glow-in-the-dark” skeleton Billy used to have hanging in his bedroom back home in Omaha.

Krissy felt an inexplicable shiver run through her when her gaze lighted on the black rectangle of the driver’s window. The streetlight reflected off it like sunlight off a frozen pond. Hissing whispers filled Krissy’s ears, but if any words were spoken she couldn’t quite make them out. She watched in mute horror as a dark shape shifted against the darkness inside the van.

Oh, my God! Is that a person? Is someone really sitting out there?

The burning need for air twisted inside her lungs, but no matter how hard or fast she breathed she couldn’t quite catch a deep enough breath. Her eyes were wide open circles that pulsed with her racing heart as she stared down at the van window and tried to pierce the darkness to see what—or who—was inside.

No, I must just be imagining it
, she thought, wishing she had enough air in her lungs to scream.
It’s just the light, playing tricks on my eyes.

An aching tiredness filled her, and she wanted nothing more than to go back to bed and forget everything.

“Someone … watches… me… with … a… guiding… light….”

Shivering wildly, she hugged herself tightly and stepped away from the window. Her knees almost buckled under her, but she steadied herself and felt her way, step by step, back to her bed. When the backs of her legs bumped into the mattress she flopped backwards, twisting around so she landed with her head on her pillow. The headboard bumped hard against the wall, and she wondered if the sound would wake up her aunt, but for long, tense seconds, the silence remained unbroken. Krissy strained to hear if the blue lady was still singing, but the night was quiet now.

No, there’s nobody out there!
Krissy thought, trying to calm herself and still wishing desperately that she could call out to her aunt.
There can’t be! That’s crazy! Who would stay outside all night, sitting in their car? No one would do something crazy like that!

But even as she thought this, she sensed that she was lying to herself. She
knew
she had seen
something
out there, and lying in the darkness, thinking about it now, she thought she now remembered actually seeing a face inside the van. It was squashed flat against the van’s window and looking up at her with eyes that glowed flat and dull in the glare of the streetlight. She whimpered softly, remembering the vacant stare she had seen in her mother’s eyes that night last spring after her father pushed her against the counter top.

And as hard as she tried not to, Krissy lay there in the dark, imagining that the face was still out there in the van window… still staring blankly up at her bedroom window and smiling hungrily at her.

Cat and Mouse

Y
ou stupid bastard! You stupid fucking bastard!

That was all Alex could think as he staggered, bleary-eyed and weak, into Denny’s on Brighton Avenue for breakfast. He’d been sitting in the van for most of the night, so his neck was stiff and his body felt like someone had tied it into a few dozen knots. A line of drool from the corner of his mouth had dried on his chin, leaving a thin crust that itched maddeningly even after he had rubbed it away.

It was a little before six o’clock in the morning as he sat down at the half-filled counter and ordered breakfast—two eggs over easy, bacon, juice, and toast. The waitress, her name tag said “Brenda,” poured him a cup of coffee. It scalded his throat when he took his first gulp, but he smiled to himself and smacked his lips. It made him feel almost half-alive.

When he thought about last night, though, at least the parts he could remember clearly, he started to feel really pissed. He couldn’t believe what he had done!

Once he was sure he had found where Cindy was living with the kids, he had stopped off at a place called the Great Lost Bear on Forest Avenue and had supper and a few—no, make that
more
than a few beers. On his way back to the motel near Exit 8 where he was staying, he picked up a twelve pack of Bud at the 7-Eleven. After he’d had a few more, too many to count, he had called up Cindy and talked to her. That must have been sometime around one or two o’clock in the morning. He couldn’t remember exactly what he had said to her, but he vaguely recalled teasing her, talking to her like they were lovers who were having a passionate, sexual affair. He chuckled, thinking about what he had
really
meant when he told her he’d been thinking about what he wanted to do to her. Then, once he was so drunk he was barely in control of what he was doing, he had actually driven over to her apartment and parked out on the street where he had continued drinking warm beer until he passed out, some time before dawn.

Christ, was that ever a fuckin’ stupid thing to do! What if Cindy had recognized his voice and now knew that he had found her?

Or what if the police had seen him parked there and had stopped to question him?

Or what if, once he was completely loaded, he had tried to drive back to the motel and had gotten into an accident or been pulled over for drunk driving?

Hell, the way he was feeling last night, he knew damned right well he would have punched the shit out of any cop who tried to hassle his ass.

Thankfully, none of those things had happened, and in the blood-shot light of day, he realized that what he had done last night had been completely asinine. He could have easily blown everything he’d been working for weeks to set up. As he took a second, more tentative sip of his coffee, he resolved not to drink
any
alcohol, at least not until he had settled his score with Cindy.

And then, by Jesus, he was going to go on one
hell
of a bender!

Now, however, all he felt was irritation.

His stomach was sour and queasy, roiling like a witch’s cauldron; his eyes felt like someone had doused them with battery acid; his head was pounding like a drop forge; and he couldn’t stop shaking as he held the warm mug with both hands and tried to take another sip of hot coffee. He knew the workers at Denny’s were used to seeing people in his condition—and worse, especially on weekends—but he was angry at himself because he didn’t want to do anything that would draw any undue attention. He could just imagine, if he was ever nailed for messing with Cindy, seeing Brenda on the evening news, snapping her gum as she spoke into the newscasters’ microphones, saying, “Oh, yeah, sure. I remember him. He used to come in here early in the morning, just about every day, looking like he’d been on a week-long binge. He always looked like trouble to me.”

No, if things were going to work out the way he wanted them to, he was going to have to start controlling himself better than he had last night, that’s all there was to it.

He glanced at his watch, thinking it was taking too damned long for his food to show up. He knew he wasn’t going to start feeling better until he had something in his stomach besides sour acid, but right now, the thought of swallowing even a bite of plain white toast made his stomach churn. Maybe what he should do was go back to the motel, chop down a handful of Turns, and get some sleep first. After all, he wasn’t on anyone’s timetable.

He decided to give Brenda another few minutes to get the food in front of him, mostly because he didn’t feel like getting up and walking out just yet. Groaning loudly, he closed his eyes and rotated his neck, trying to work out some of the kinks. Damn, he wished he’d thought to buy a bottle of aspirin before coming in here. Denny’s should be used to having customers with hangovers. Didn’t they have an aspirin dispenser somewhere? Maybe in the restrooms.

Yeah, the restrooms, Alex thought, suddenly aware of the aching pressure in his bladder.

He spun off the counter stool, surprised that his legs supported him as he headed for the men’s room. He took halting steps and dragged one hand along the wall to help him maintain his balance. Bursting through the bathroom door, he kicked it open so hard it slammed against the tile wall with a rumbling reverberation. The stab of bright fluorescent lights hurt his eyes. His vision swam as he looked at the array of open toilet stalls and smelled the sharp sting of disinfectant, which made the bile in his stomach kick up into his throat.

Oh, shit… oh, shit! I’m gonna puke!

Suddenly panicking, he lunged forward, trying to make it to the nearest toilet stall, but his stomach squeezed like a fist and a hot flood of vomit shot out of his mouth, splattering onto the tile floor. He twisted to one side, hoping at least to make it to the sink before the second wave came. He slipped in the wet puke and almost fell but, grabbing the edge of the counter, pulled himself up. Dizzying waves of nausea made him double over as another fountain of vomit spewed onto the floor.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!
he thought.

Snorting loudly, he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand as hot flashes made a sheen of sweat break out over his face. He was trembling like a man with epilepsy and couldn’t believe what he was seeing when he looked into the mirror over the row of sinks and saw the pale, sick man reflected there. Nearly blind with misery, he fumbled to turn on the cold water faucet, but it was the kind that automatically shut off as soon as you let go of it. That may help save on the water bill, but there was no way he could fill his cupped hands to wash his face. Leaning down into the sink, he did his best to fill one hand and splash the water against his cheeks. He slurped up a mouthful or two of water, hoping it would wash away the sour taste in his mouth, but a third wave of sickness took hold of him, shaking him as a thin, yellowish fluid shot into the sink and splattered the counter top.

You fucking moron!
he thought. He wished he’d had the sense not to drink so much last night or at least to go back to his motel room if he was going to be this bad off.

He leaned forward and, resting his head on his forearm, ran the water so he could flick it up into his face. Alternating waves of chills and fever shook his body, but now that his stomach was empty he
did
feel marginally better. At least there was nothing left in his stomach to spew out. He lost track of time and almost forgot about his breakfast, which must be on the counter by now, as he waited for his stomach to settle. The after taste in the back of his throat was terrible, but as he started to calm down he was filled with sudden violent surges of anger. He didn’t even consider why or against whom his anger was directed—whether it was at Cindy, his dead wife, his fucking children, or himself; all he knew was a blinding red rage that made him want to destroy something.

Sputtering, with water still dripping from his face, he straightened up and looked around the bathroom. The bright, clean tiles and empty toilet stalls seemed almost to mock him. He clenched his fists tightly and watched the veins in his arms fill with blood. Muscles and tendons stood out on his arms like knotted strands of rope. A low cry started to build inside him, and before he knew what he was doing he lunged forward and punched the mirror as hard as he could. It shattered and spilled broken glass onto the counter. Spinning around on his heel, he punched the door of the nearest stall. The impact sent a jolt of pain through his hand, but he was satisfied when he saw the cratered dent he made. Lashing out wildly, he kicked and punched his way down the line of stalls, not caring where his blows landed. The restroom echoed with deafening booms like pounding drum rolls as he flailed around, smashing anything he connected with. A spinning kick knocked the paper towel dispenser off the wall. It clattered on the floor, echoing as loud as a car accident.

The outburst didn’t last long, no more than half a minute. When it was over, Alex stood there in the middle of the restroom floor, leaning over with his hands on his knees and panting heavily as he scanned the damage he had done. He saw the gigantic spider-web crack in the mirror but didn’t even remember doing. Looking at his fists, he expected to see that they were bruised and bleeding from cut glass, but, except for a bone-deep ache, they seemed fine… for now. The pain might come later. The doors of the toilet stalls, especially the one closest to him, looked like someone had been pelting them with barrages of rocks. One door was hanging from a single hinge. There were streamers of toilet paper strewn all across the floor like there had been a ticker-tape celebration in the room.

“All right, goddamnit,” Alex whispered, wincing as he wiped the sweat from his upper lip on his forearm.

He went over to the sink and washed his face again as best he could, then dried himself with a handful of paper towels he picked up off the floor. His whole body was vibrating with tension as he started for the door, feeling equally exhilarated and close to physical collapse. He was mildly surprised that no one from the restaurant had heard what he was doing in there and had come in to investigate. Either they were all deaf, or else they were used to shit like that happening now and again.

What the fuck!

It didn’t matter.

As he stepped out into the hallway and headed back to the counter, Alex decided that he wasn’t very hungry. His plate of eggs and bacon sat steaming on the counter, but he simply nodded at Brenda and walked past her for the front door. Over the waitress’s shouted protests that he couldn’t stick her with his tab he went outside, got into the van, and drove away. He had decided that what he needed right now was about twelve hours of sleep, then he’d see what he wanted to do about Cindy.

And so what if he couldn’t go back to Denny’s any more. He was getting tired of their fucking food, anyway!

2

N
ow that school had started and the kids weren’t around the apartment for most of day Cindy had no idea what to do with herself. Every day, rain or shine, Billy chose to walk the mile or so to and from school with his friends, Chris and Michael. Rather than have Krissy ride the school bus, Cindy picked her up from school around two o’clock. That still gave her almost six hours a day where she had absolutely nothing to do. After the first full week of school, she realized that she could clean the apartment and do laundry only so much. Starting with the second week of school, she spent a lot of time shopping at the Maine Mall and wandering around downtown on Exchange Street, looking at all the quaint shops.

Although money wasn’t a problem—not yet, anyway—Cindy considered applying for a part time job, if only so she’d have something to do with her time. The biggest obstacle was that there was no way she would be able to supply references from her bank job back home in Omaha. She considered lying about her experience, saying that she had been out of the work force for the past ten years while she raised her children, and now that her youngest was in school all day she was ready to start a career. She also realized the best thing she could probably get would be a job bagging groceries at the local Shop ’n Save. Besides, it had been risky enough opening a bank account and renting the apartment under her own name; there was no sense in advertising who she was to the police or anyone else.

In all this time, she still hadn’t stopped thinking about Harry and wondering why she hadn’t heard from him. She had long ago given up trying to call and leave a message on his answering machine. His total silence confounded her. Even if he intended to abandon her he should at least have been in touch with her so they could begin divorce proceedings, if it had come to that. Didn’t he owe her that much? She just couldn’t believe that, after all the years they’d been together, he could just drop her without a word. Even if he was hurt or in some kind of serious trouble, maybe with the business, she expected that he would at least call or contact her somehow.

She wracked her brain trying to think of some way to get in touch with him, but everything she came up with seemed too risky. Contacting an old friend in the area was out of the question because she didn’t want to involve anyone, no matter how worried she was. She knew that he would have to sign for a registered letter if she sent one, but she didn’t want anything going to Omaha with her new address on it. She had considered asking Alice if she could use her name and address for such a letter, but after the night when she had unloaded her whole story on her, Cindy didn’t feel at all comfortable asking Alice to get any more involved. It was one thing to know what was going on, but quite another to ask for help with this complicated business.