A wasteland of strangers (12 page)

Front-page editorial: STRANGERS IN OUR MIDST.

What in God's name is the matter with Douglas Kent? I thought angrily when I finished reading it. He might as well have headed this crap AN INVITATION TO VIOLENCE.

George Petrie

I DID IT.

Oh God, I did it, I took the money!

All afternoon I worried that I wouldn't have enough nerve when the time came, the anxiety building as the bank clock crept toward six. Wasn't until I said good night to Fred and Arlene and locked the rear door behind them that I knew for sure I was going through with it. And then, even while I was doing it, it all seemed to be some kind of waking dream—everything happening in slow motion, real and yet not real. Half of me watching the other half: Empty the vault of every bill except one-dollar notes. Carry the bags to the rear door. Set the time lock and close the vault. Tear up the printed list of serial numbers and flush the scraps down the toilet. Falsify some of the set of numbers on the computer and consign the rest to cyberspace limbo. Unlock the back door, make sure the lot was clear. Carry the bags out two at a time. Relock the door and get into the car. Seemed to take hours; my watch said forty-five minutes. Three quarters of an hour, 2,700 seconds, to steal $200,000.

I'm still sitting here behind the wheel, another three or four minutes gone, waiting for my hands to stop shaking. I need a drink desperately, but I don't dare stop anywhere before I get home. I feel numb, awed. All that money stuffed into six plastic garbage bags, the kind we use in the paper-towel hampers in the bathroom. Garbage bags! I want to laugh, but I'm afraid if I do I won't be able to stop.

Calm, everything depends on remaining calm. Can't stay here much longer... suppose a patrol car comes in and the officers see me sitting alone in the dark? Mustn't do anything to call attention to myself, arouse suspicion. If only my hands will steady enough so I can drive. Once I'm home, with a stiff jolt of scotch inside me, I'll be all right. Even if Ramona notices how wired I am, it won't matter. Won't be there long, just long enough to pack. One thing worked out, the story I'll tell her: Have to drive down to Santa Rosa; Harvey Patterson called and the real-estate deal may be on again after all, could mean big money for us, lot of details to be worked out in a hurry so I'll probably be gone all weekend, might even stay over until Monday morning and then drive straight up to open the bank. Maybe she'll believe it and maybe she'll think I'm up to something, but she won't try to stop me. Questions, yes, Ramona the parrot with her bright little bird eyes, but I can handle her questions. She won't tell anybody I'm away for the weekend—I'll swear her to secrecy, claim the real-estate deal has to remain hush-hush for the time being. She'll sulk, but she'll do what I say. I don't have anything to worry about from Ramona.

On the road no later than eight-thirty, out of this damn prison for good. But I won't head south. East. Spend the night somewhere beyond Sacramento, up in the Sierras. Not sure yet where I'll go from there, but I'll have plenty of time to make up my mind. Have to make it as far away from Pomo as possible by Monday morning, that's definite. Means a lot of driving, careful driving with the precious cargo in the trunk, but that can't be helped. I'll manage. Have to get rid of the Buick at some point, but maybe that can wait until I get to wherever I'm going. Some place I can settle in unobtrusively for a long, quiet stay. Change my appearance before I get there, too—dye my hair, buy a pair of glasses. Then rent a house or cabin with no close neighbors, hole up for a month, two months, even longer just to be safe. The FBI investigation has to've been back-burnered by the first of the year. Then I can travel again, go somewhere warm, somewhere exciting, Florida Gold Coast maybe, where I can start spending some of the money. Start living again.

But that's all in the future. First things first. Start the car, drive away from here, drive home. Can't go anywhere without going home first.

Christ, why won't my hands stop shaking?

Trisha Marx

OUT THERE IN the dark, Anthony kept shouting my name. He'd sounded annoyed at first, then kind of exasperated; now he was just pissed. He had a flashlight from the car and he kept shining it here and there over the trees and bushes, trying to find me. But he didn't even come close to where I was hiding under a big pile of dead branches and oak leaves.

"Trish, goddamn it! You better come out, man. I'll leave you here, I mean it, I'll drive off and you can freakin' walk home. That ain't gonna make things any better. Trish? Shit, Trisha!"

The flashlight beam danced and stabbed. It was hard, white, like frozen light, and it kept cutting weird wedges and strips out of the dark—parts of tree trunks and limbs, ferns, rocks, like pieces in the magazine montage on the wall of my room. Don't like all those pieces... I'm still stoned. Three joints, way too many. Why'd I think it'd be easier to tell him if I smoked some dope first? Stupid. Weirded me out and made him horny. Come on, querida, I'm getting lover's nuts. Oh yeah? Come on, Anthony, Vm already pregnant with your kid. Wham. No more lover's nuts, huh, Anthony?

It ain't mine. I always used a rubber.

At least one time you didn't.

It ain't mine. You been screwing somebody else.

That's the lowest, Anthony. You know better.

I don't want no freakin' kid!

You think I do?

Get rid of it.

No.

You want me to marry you? No way, man.

What happened to "I love you, Trish"? Just bullshit to get into my pants, right?

I ain't getting married. Lose the kid or we're quits.

I knew it. I knew it'd be like this. I knew it!

Slapped him, hard, harder than I ever thought I could hit anybody. And then out of the car, into the woods. And here I am.

"One more minute, Trisha. That's all you got."

Jerking light, pieces of the night. But I couldn't see him at all. Good. I never wanted to see his crappy, lying face again.

"I mean it. One minute and I'm outta here, I'm history."

Fuck you, Anthony. You're already history.

I lay there shivering, waiting for him to go away, get the hell out of my life. The wind up here on the Bluffs was like ice, even down low to the ground where I was. The water in the lake must be like ice, too. Black ice. Deep, black ice.

"Okay! That's the way you want it, man, it's on your head. I'm gone."

The light blinked out. So dark again I couldn't see a thing through the leaves, not even the shapes of the oak branches swaying in the moany wind overhead. But I could hear him crunching around out there, heading back to his junky Trans Am. Door slam, revving engine. Light again, spraying the trees, spraying the bare ground out toward the cliff edge as he swung away onto the road. Run, you asshole, go ahead and run. And the light faded away and he was gone and I was alone. Stoned and pregnant and all alone.

He wouldn't come back. If I knew him, he'd go find Mateo and the two of them'd buy some coke or crank and really get whacked. If I knew him . . . only I didn't. I thought I did and how he felt about me, but I was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. My mistake. My kid. All alone.

"I don't care," I said out loud. "Doesn't matter. I don't give a shit about anything anymore."

Then I started to bawl. I couldn't help it. I lay there bawling my head off, with my knees pulled up against my chest, and I couldn't stop—for the longest time I couldn't stop. Couldn't suck in enough air and then I got too much and started to hiccup and then finally I stopped hiccuping and just lay there, tear-wet and cold and empty.

Empty, man.

After a while I crawled out from under the leaves and dead stuff and stood up, all shaky and feeling even more weirded out than before. That wind was really icy. Black ice up here, black ice down in the lake. The open part of the Bluffs was off to my left and I went in that direction, toward the road. Once I tripped over something and fell and skinned my knee, but I didn't care about that either. I wasn't thinking about anything anymore. I felt so empty and weird. When I came out of the trees I saw the road, empty like I was, leading down, but I didn't go that way. Instead I walked out toward the cliff edge. I still wasn't thinking about anything.

Then I was standing right on the edge, where the ground falls away sharp and straight down. Seventy or eighty feet straight down. The wind shoved at me like hands, so hard I could barely keep my balance. Over on the far shore the town lights and house lights winked and shimmered, reflecting off the black ice. Anthony was over there by now, maybe. And Daddy . . . Oh, God, how could I tell him? He'd have a hemorrhage. I quit looking at the lights and looked straight down instead. Some rocks down there, in among the cottonwoods and willows ... never mind that. Look at how shiny the black ice is, out away from the shore. Lean forward so you can see better. Heights don't bother me. Deep, black ice doesn't bother me either. I felt so weird. The dope ... Anthony ... the baby ... my trashed life. But I wasn't afraid. Shiny, black ice. Lean out just a little farther—

Noises behind me, quick and close and louder than the wind. And somebody said, "You don't want to do that."

I almost lost my balance turning to look. My foot started to slip. But he was almost on top of me then, a big, black shape that caught my arm and yanked me back and swung me around before he let go. Then he was the one standing at the edge, with his back to it, like a wall that had sprung up there.

"Pretty close call," he said. "You ought to be more careful."

I couldn't see his face too clearly. All I could see was that he was big, real big. My arm hurt where he'd grabbed me.

"Who're you?" My voice sounded funny, like somebody pulling up a rusty nail. "Where'd you come from?"

"I've been up here awhile. Where'd you come from? The car that drove off a few minutes ago?"

"Doesn't matter." I was still thinking about black ice, but I didn't feel so spacey anymore. The weed high was starting to wear off. "Why'd you grab me like that?"

"I didn't want you to fall."

"Why should you care?"

"Why shouldn't I? What's your name?"

"Trisha."

"Trishawhat?"

"Marx, okay? What's yours?"

"John Faith."

I rubbed my arm. "You're the guy in the Porsche. At the Chevron station yesterday."

"That's right."

"Stranger everybody's talking about." I guess I should've been afraid then, on account of the things people were saying about him, but I wasn't. Not even a little.

He didn't say anything, so I said, "What're you doing up on the Bluffs?"

"Watching the lights."

"What lights?"

"Around the lake."

"By yourself? What for?"

"Safer than spending the evening with an armful of potential trouble."

"Huh?"

"Never mind. You have a fight with your boyfriend?"

"More than a fight. He's not my boyfriend anymore. I hate his guts."

"That's the way you feel now. Tomorrow ..."

"Tomorrow I'll hate him even more."

"Why? He do something to you?"

"He did something, all right. I wish I could do something to him." Like cut off his lover's nuts.

"What'd he do, Trisha?"

"He got me pregnant."

I don't know why I told him. A guy I didn't know, a stranger everybody was saying was some kind of criminal. I don't think I could've told Selena straight out like that, and she's my best friend. But I wasn't sorry I told him. It was like spitting out something that was choking you.

"And he doesn't want to marry you, right? That's why he's gone and you're still here."

"Yeah."

"Your parents know yet?"

"No. My mother wouldn't care if she did—she's been gone three years and she didn't even send me a card on my last birthday. Daddy cares, but he'll have a hemorrhage when he finds out."

"Maybe he'll surprise you."

"Doesn't matter anyway," I said. "7 don't care. About the kid or his asshole father or what happens to me. I just don't give a shit anymore."

"Sure you do. You care, Trisha."

"Oh, right, you know more about me than I do. What makes you so smart?"

"Hurt inside, don't you? Worst pain you've ever felt?"

"No. Yeah. So what if I do?"

"Then you care. People who don't care don't hurt. Think about it. The more you hurt, the more you care."

"I don't want to think about it. All I want is to stop hurting."

"That's what everybody wants. Bottom line. Everybody hurts, everybody wants to stop hurting. Trick is to find a way to do it without hurting anyone else. Or yourself."

"Isn't any way."

"Not for some. But you're young. You'll be all right if you don't let yourself stop caring."

I was shivering again, hard. That wind was really cold. And the high was all gone, and most of the weirdness, and some of the emptiness. I could still see the lake down below, the deep, black ice; then I shook my head and the shiny image went away. I hugged myself.

"How about if I give you a ride home?" John Faith said. "My car's off the road a ways and the heater works good."

Don't ever accept rides from strangers. How many times had that been drummed into my head? But I didn't hesitate. He didn't scare me; I wasn't scared of him at all.

I said, "All right," and went with him into the dark.

Zenna Wilson

THE LORD WORKS in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform. For the second time that day He put me in a position to bear witness to the evil in our midst and do something about it.

I had just finished checking the chain and dead-bolt locks on the front door, and was standing by the window, testing its catch, when I heard a car outside. It was noisy, noisy-familiar, and when I parted the drapes I saw the disreputable car of that stranger, John Faith, rattle by and swing to the curb a short distance up the street. The passenger door flew open almost immediately and a young girl jumped out and ran off. It gave me quite a shock. The more so when I recognized Trisha Marx as soon as she passed under the streetlamp over there.

Her house was where she ran to, three north of ours. I expected the bogey to leap out and chase after her, but he didn't. Took him by surprise, no doubt, and he knew he couldn't catch her. In any event, he sat inside with the headlights still on and the engine puffing out exhaust fumes until Trisha disappeared around back. Then he U-turned and drove off the way they'd come.