Appalachian Galapagos (29 page)

Angela made a casserole and carried it across the small lawn between the two homes. Henry was surprised when he saw her at the door. She could have sworn there were tears in his eyes as he ushered her inside, effusive in his hospitality. It was just as she remembered it, everything perfect and in place. She and
Glynnis
used to compete for the cleanest home. As hard as she tried, Angela was no match for the perfect orderliness of her friend. And it seemed as if Henry had kept up the tradition.

She placed the dish in the sparse refrigerator and asked if
Glynnis
was awake. Henry nodded a choked
yes
and gestured for her to follow.

Angela could smell her friend before she had limped halfway up the stairs. It was the
sick
smell that too many of her friends now had. She knew it as death, like the stench of the Reaper himself as he sat in a corner and waited. She had never known any of her friends to survive it.

David had been lucky and died before the smell came, but she remembered how he had made her promise never to let him get the smell. He had made her promise one night to shoot him. He had even shown her his pistol and how to use it. He had hated the odor and didn't want to live within its cloying grasp. The gun still sat on the top shelf of her closet under her winter sweaters—untouched.

She followed Henry into the bedroom. As she entered, she gasped. Her friend had aged twenty years since she had last seen her and lay like a long lump beneath the yellow and white quilt. The gray hair was ragged and thin, but Angela could see where Henry had tried to fix it. He wasn't a woman, though. He had meant well, but he had no idea.

Angela made a beeline for the silver-backed brush and knelt painfully before her friend. She began to brush and speak with
Glynnis
, telling her about her day, the flowers and the birds cavorting among the branches of the dogwood. Angela stopped when she noticed the dead and staring eyes.

Angela dropped the brush and heard it clatter to the floor. She turned to Henry who stared back at her with the saddest eyes she had ever seen.

"I had to. I just had to," he said, as a sob burst from his lips.

Angela looked again and saw the rumpled pillow sitting across her friend's waist. Stains of red lipstick marred the perfect white surface of the pillowcase and Angela spun, accusing Henry with her eyes.

He gasped and turned. She followed him, rage building within her. He had no right to kill her. It wasn't his to decide.

Henry entered the guestroom and she saw twenty plastic cages, half of them holding the kittens of her dreams. Henry reached into one and pulled out a purring ball of fur and sighed as it licked his palm. He turned and walked by her and into the room of his dead wife. Gently, he placed it under the
Glynnis
' cold still hand.

The kitten lay placid beneath the comfortable weight and began to purr. Angela watched as its eyes closed and it began to casually lick its front right paw.

The hand and the kitten and the place suddenly hit her. She had
rememoried
it. The memory that she'd taken a look at had been Henry's.

"I tried so hard. She loved the cats so much. She loved their softness and the way they were so much better than dogs. Like they were their own person. But...but she couldn't control herself. She got to where she couldn't even control her own hands. She would just forget, is all. She would forget what she was doing. She never meant to kill them. Especially yours. I know she was sorry for killing it. Terribly sorry."

Angela stared from Henry to
Glynnis
and then to the kitten purring gently under the dead hand.

"God, how she loved kittens. It was the only thing that made her smile. I've tried to forget." Henry chuckled softly. "I can't tell you how many times The
Rememory
Man's been here. Dozens. Maybe hundreds? Hell, I can't be sure. I got so many open spaces in my mind, I wonder who I really am."

Angela limped over and put her arms around the small old man. She remembered now. Not the
rememory
, but her memory. She had never known it had continued for so long after her friend had killed her
Precious
. The shock had kept her away for a year. She thought of the kittens in the guestroom and the holes in the back yard and wondered why The
Rememory
Man had given her this memory.

All right, I admit it—I get off on it.

That's not a sin, is it? I mean, I only watch, I don't actually do anything. My wife, Jessica, doesn't know a damn thing, and I'm proud of that. I've always felt that a man needs secrets. A man's not a man unless she has his own little covert things to do. What she doesn't know won't hurt her and, hell, nobody knows except yours truly. There's a good reason for that, too, which is basically because what I do is illegal. It's not a felony or anything, but I know that I'll at least spend some time in jail if I ever get caught, which I never will.

I'm too damn quick.

Basically, what I do is watch people. That sounds pretty normal, doesn't it? Of course, it's a little more complex than that. I watch people during their private moments. Many people are probably guilty of that, too. But how many of those people have looked through their neighbor's window? That's what I do. Every night I tell Jessica that I'm going out for my nightly walk, and I get to work.

Over the years, I've learned a hell of a lot about my neighbors.

For example, Mrs. Richmond, the widow who lives three houses down the road, masturbates every night. She turns on the ten o'clock news, lifts up her nightgown and gets to work, hands pumping rhythmically from beneath her dress, her face wrenching around in all kinds of animated contortions. Every once in awhile, she'll look up and study the blandly handsome face of the newscaster, get a good eyeful, then return to her work. This woman's seventy-five years old and she does it more than I did when I was fourteen. And I'm not going to lie to you—I did it a hell of a lot.

Father Wilson, my church's priest, sits in his easy chair every night and picks his nose to "The Cisco Kid" by
War
. Sometimes he uses other funk tracks—James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone—you know the type. Lots of bass, horns and drums. You'll probably say I'm lying, but I swear to God and hope to die it's the truth. I've seen him do it. I've only watched him a few times, but those times I had he picked some real winners out of that nose. Somehow, I doubt that God would care. Even Jesus probably picked a little buddy out of there on occasion.

Eddie Foley, a local high school teacher, waits until his wife goes to bed and then he begins to clean his cat. This sounds normal on the surface, but this guy doesn't use soap and water, he uses what the feline population uses to get the dirty job done:
his tongue
. He starts at the animal's head, and then continues until the entire body is clean. Clean by his standards, anyway. He doesn't hurt the animal or anything, actually the kitty seems to enjoy it, especially when John gets to those…hard to clean spots. I'd hate to see the hairballs coughed up in that house.

Jill Williams, who is a cop in our local police department, does everything in the nude. She gets home, pulls off her clothes and then proceeds to do all of her business in the flesh. She vacuums, talks on the phone, washes her clothes, and feeds her dog in her pink birthday suit. Of course, she closes all of her shades, but that never stops me. She always leaves it open at least a crack. She's kind of pudgy, but she's not that bad looking. If I wasn't married, I'd do her.

Michael Murray, the chief fireman, walks around in the nude too, '
cept
he does it with a mop handle in his ass. I guess he's not totally nude. He wears his fire hat. He dances too, this weird
Riverdance
-looking jig, the mop handle swinging all over the fucking place in his wake. You can actually hear the handle whistling through the air this boy dances so fast. I laughed so hard the first time I saw this I nearly shit myself. Disgusting? Very. Entertaining? Indeed it is.

Victoria Simpson is probably the saddest one. Her husband recently left her for a nineteen-year-old cutie. She's in her fifties now, a long way from being able to play the field with any real success. Nearly every night she puts on this real glitzy dress and does her makeup like a glamorous movie star. Then she stands in front of the living room mirror lip syncing to Nina Simone's "Wild is the Wind.” She never makes it to the end before she breaks down crying in a fetal position. I don't watch her anymore—too depressing.

Just because I get off on what I do, doesn't mean that I'm not faithful to my wife. I would never cheat on her.

Watching's not cheating.

Sure, sometimes I get sexually aroused when I'm watching, sometimes I even masturbate, but that doesn't mean that I'd actually do anything. I don't even believe that I get aroused from the people; it's the act that gets my motor running. The fact is that at any given moment that someone could catch me in the act. The risk is basically what causes the adrenaline to go rushing through my veins like a good fix. I actually sleep better on the nights that I watch.

The way that I describe everything you'd think that all of my neighbors are a bunch of perverts, which is definitely not the case. Most of them actually have normal sex lives and do normal things when they don't know that they are being watched. Besides, how many people can say that they haven't indulged in a little bit of weirdness once they think the world isn't looking at them? How many of us haven't danced up a storm to our favorite piece of music once the shade is closed, hmm?

Many people would say that I'm a Peeping Tom, but I always hated that term. It sounds so childish, doesn't it?

What I do is basically observe people. You'll probably say that it's all semantics, but there
is
a difference. One reason that I really like what I do is the sense of power I achieve during observation. The fact that I can see them, and that they can't see me, is a feeling that borders on the religious. I get to see a human being when they are being their absolute selves. Think about it. These people are doing the kinds of things that no one will ever know. I am seeing them as they really are. It's almost like being able to watch their soul. All the masks that they wear during the day are instantly stripped away and they are left bare. How many could claim to see a human being on the same level that I do?

Only God.

"Are you going out for a walk tonight?" my wife asked.

I looked away from the floor, where I had been lost in thought. "Yeah. A walk will probably do me pretty good tonight. Wanna come?"

I only asked her that because I knew that she was going to say no. For about a week she actually did walk with me, which pretty much drove me out of my fucking mind. Thank God she grew bored of that pretty quick.

My wife was always going through phases or kicks. One week it's health food, another it's dance exercise. How can anyone's interest be so fleeting?

After she said no, I kissed her goodnight and went to get changed into my clothes. My white sweatshirt, when turned inside out, becomes a black sweatshirt. My nightly deed demanded that I wear dark clothing. I also kept a ski mask in the garage, which I grabbed on the way out.

Tonight was a special night. Down the street we have some new neighbors that have just moved in. Basically, I'm going to give them my own personal welcome. I've waited for about two months for them to get settled. It's a young couple. Although I've only seen the woman once, she is absolutely stunning. It's going to be a true joy to observe her soul. I can only hope that her husband won't be home so I can watch her as she really is, with no masks. The man looks to be in his early thirties with dark, slicked-back hair. Kind of a girly man; effeminate. No threat to me.

As I walk down the sidewalk, I turn around and watch as the last light in my house goes out. My wife has gone to bed. The rest of the block appears to be going into television mode. I think I better talk a little bit about the television people, because I fear that I've made my nightly activities appear too interesting earlier.

For every person with some kind of sexual fetish there are about eight normal people. Usually, when I sneak up to a window and peer inside, it becomes mind numbingly boring. The television people are the ones that sit in front of their sets like slack-jawed zombies, giggling and chortling because the laugh track on tonight's sitcom rerun told them to. One time I actually started watching the damn TV with the guy I was observing. Talk about bored. Here I am, in somebody's bush, risking my whole life, and I'm
watchin
' fucking “HEE HAW” with some mama-
luke
. You tell me what's wrong with that picture. Sure, once in awhile someone will lean sideways and let rip a
godawfully
loud fart, but who in the hell wants to see (hear) that? I like a little spice in my observances. Give me a good old-fashioned shoe fetish, or some fat guy dancing his ass off in the nude and I'm smiling wide in entertainment heaven. The only thing worse than the TV people are the book people, and do I need to go on anymore?