Mania (4 page)

Sam gave his brother a gentle tap on the arm. “So where are you off to?” he said, brightening. “Why are you in such a hurry? It must be something important.”

Nick’s eyes brightened as well. “I met this girl,” he said. “I was going to tell you.”

“You like her, huh? She must be pretty special.”

Nick opened his mouth to tell Sam about Sara. Sam’s wolfish expression, though, silenced him.

“Are you okay, bro’?”

Nick remembered that Sara was waiting for him. “I’m fine,” he resolved. “Really. But I have to go.”

“You sure?”

Nick pulled away from Sam, twisting to slide through the open door into the Toyota.

“Do you want me to drive you?”

Nick inserted the key into the ignition. The engine turned over a few times, then ground to a halt. He tried a second time. Again, the cylinders sparked, then died. The battery sounded weak.

“Let me drive you,” Sam said again.

Nick felt a burst of adrenaline surge through his veins. With more time, he would have taken a taxi. He couldn’t have defined the feeling, but the last thing he wanted was to get into his brother’s new car.

“It’ll be better to show up in a car like mine anyway,” Sam said. “And like this, I’ll get a chance to see this girl of yours myself.”

Impossibly, Sara was even more beautiful than Nick remembered her.

He spotted her from the passenger seat as Sam navigated his new BMW through traffic. She stood out from the crowd at the bus stop downtown where he had arranged to pick her up, tall and slender, dressed in jeans and a short, shiny leather jacket. Her long blond hair was tangled slightly in a scarf laced with a metallic wool weave. Nick was aware of the look on his brother’s face when he pointed her out to him. Sam didn’t say a word, but simply stared at her.

Nick pulled the latch and jumped from the car, stepping up onto the red-painted curb to greet her. When their eyes met, he could barely contain his excitement.

Sara, though, hardly seemed to notice him. She was distracted by the sight of another driver. “I thought you’d be coming alone,” she said. “Who’s this?”

“It’s my brother, Sam.”

Sara squinted, trying to get a better view into the car.

“My car broke down. Sam offered to give us a ride.”

Waiting for her to turn back toward him, Nick watched, inexplicably shaken, his hands icy cold, as Sam and Sara peered at one another through the slightly tinted windshield.

Nick had been balling his hands into tight fists. It was only when he loosened his fingers that he realized how cold he was. Midnight in January in Madison, Wisconsin, the dead of a Midwestern winter. There were no streets anymore in the rural neighborhood, only gingerbread houses sagging beneath the weight of a heavy snowfall. The air was still. It was so quiet Nick could hear the muffled sound of snow dropping from branches and eaves blocks away.

I can’t watch TV with you, Nick. I don’t want to.
Elizabeth Munroe’s voice rang in his ears.
There’s a dance tonight. At Visitation.

Earlier that day, Nick had crossed the lawn separating his house from the Munroes’. Elizabeth Munroe had been waiting for him on her front porch. In his right hand, shoved into the pocket of his heavy parka, Nick was clutching a silver chain he had bought for Elizabeth the weekend before. At four o’clock, the sun was already disappearing from the low, heavy sky, throwing orange shadows across Elizabeth’s face. Nick considered the seventeen-year-old girl in front of him, aware of how warm the silver chain had become in his hand. He understood that this random moment was a turning point.
I’ll go with you to the dance, then
, he said.

Elizabeth’s eyes dropped from Nick’s.
I’ve already asked someone else.

Who?

Elizabeth hesitated.
That doesn’t matter, does it?

Nick wanted to protest. He wanted to remind her that they were boyfriend and girlfriend. But he couldn’t speak the words.
Is this really what you want?
he asked her weakly instead.

I’ve got to go
, she said.
I’ve got to get ready
.

Nick let the silver chain slide out of his hand to the bottom of his pocket. He crossed the snow-covered lawn back to his house and lay down on his bed. Dropping onto his bed still in his school clothes, he fell asleep before dinner, ignoring the shout from his mother when it was time to eat. At ten it began to snow heavily. Nick had gotten into bed with his window wide open, and thick flakes of snow came swirling into his room, melting into the air as they met the heat.

Nick woke up in a sweat before midnight. His parents had already gone to sleep for the night, and the house was completely dark. He bundled up into his jacket and scarf and gloves, then trudged across the lawns separating his house from the Munroes’ next door. The lights were still on downstairs. When he saw Elizabeth’s mother cross through the foyer from the living room into the kitchen, he screwed up his courage and climbed the steps to the front door. Elizabeth’s mother shielded her eyes as she peered outside to see who was ringing the bell so late. She smiled when she flicked on the light. She had always liked Nick.

“Elizabeth’s not back yet,” she said to him, glancing at her wristwatch. “I thought maybe she was out with you.”

“No.” Nick avoided her eyes.

“I don’t know when she’s getting back. It
is
Friday night.” She stood with the door in her hand, scrutinizing Nick. “You’re welcome to come in and wait for a while if you’d like.”

“That’s okay.” Nick tried to conceal his embarrassment.

“I’ll tell her you stopped by.”

Nick walked back down the steps, then crossed the lawns again, retracing his tracks. He sat down on the short set of stairs that ascended the swell in the lawn halfway between his family’s house and the curb, in the shelter of two tall birch trees, hunching forward, trying to stay warm. Heavy snowflakes tumbled down toward him through the black sky, accumulating in a thin layer as powdery as baking soda. Time passed slowly, and Nick managed to forget about the cold until he loosened his fingers and then curled them back into fists, and sharp needles of pain shot through his fingertips.

Sometime after midnight, the night’s silence was broken by the sound of an approaching engine. When the car was a block away, Nick recognized it as the Munroes’. Elizabeth had gotten her license the year before when she turned sixteen. Nick pushed himself forward a little on the stairs, readying himself to confront her. He had no idea what he was going to say. All night long he had been looking forward to this moment. Now that it was here, though, he was awash in confusion.

When the car crawled through the thick snow in front of Nick’s house, he realized with a shock that someone was sitting with Elizabeth. She hadn’t come home alone. Nick watched the car as it slid sideways to a stop. His eyes were trained on the passenger door, waiting for it to open so that he could see who it was.

The door remained shut. Inside the car, the two black silhouettes merged into one. Nick realized that Elizabeth and her date were locked together in a kiss. He felt tears sting his eyes. He wanted to turn and to run back into his house. He remained frozen where he was, waiting.

At last, the passenger door swung open, and the dim yellow light flickered on inside. Nick’s heart leapt as its glow fell across the face of the person who had been kissing Elizabeth.

He watched Sam step from the car.

“Nick?” Nick was hardly aware of the pressure of Sara’s hand on his shoulder. She was shaking him, and Nick was looking back at her, into her eyes. He wasn’t focusing on her, though. The voice speaking his name seemed to be coming at him from a huge distance, resonating toward him like the sound of a stone being thrown against the walls of a long, narrow tunnel. “Nick? Are you okay?”

Nick blinked a few times, then at last brought Sara into focus. The cacophony of the traffic blared in his ears. He was surprised to find himself in downtown Seattle. He had felt so deeply transported back to Madison, he was disoriented.

“Are you okay?” Sara asked again. She didn’t try to hide her concern.

“Hmmm?”

“You were in a trance.”

When Nick smiled, her face melted into a genuine smile, too. Nick felt her fingers, cold in the late afternoon, sliding into his own. She drew herself into him, and he could smell the clean scent of her lipstick. Once again, as he recovered himself, his excitement overwhelmed him.

“Let’s just pretend your brother’s not here,” she said. “It’s good to see you. I’ve been thinking about you all day. I wanted to be alone with you—so that I wouldn’t feel self-conscious when I did this.” The movement toward him was so graceful that Nick had the impression that it was in slow motion. Her cheeks were cool. Her lips, though, were warm. Her hands squeezed his even tighter. Unexpectedly, she stood up onto her toes and, closing her eyes, kissed him, almost furtively. Nick hesitated, and then he was kissing her back.

The dull, hollow sound of a drum beating resolved itself into the sound of Sam rapping the windshield with his knuckles. Reluctantly, Nick drew himself back from Sara, aware of his brother’s impatience inside the car. A bus, Nick realized, had pulled up behind the BMW, and Sam needed to get out of its way. “We’d better go,” he said.

Sara didn’t let go of his hands. He had to pull away to open the front door for her. On his way into the backseat, he turned to look at the bus. The driver was looking back at him, an annoyed but envious look on his face.

“I hope this isn’t out of your way,” Sara was saying to Sam as Nick closed the door behind him. “It’s not much fun driving downtown at rush hour.”

“My name is Sam,” he said, introducing himself.

“Nick told me.” Sara twisted around in her seat and looked into Nick’s eyes as Sam began accelerating from the curb. “You’re his older brother. Sam.” She flashed Nick a smile, then turned to Sam. “You didn’t have to do this,” she said to him flatly. “We could just as easily have walked.”

“It’s only a few minutes driving.”

Sara’s leather jacket squeaked against the new leather of the seat as she turned back toward Nick once again. “You could almost be twins. The two of you look so much alike.”

“Sam’s three years older than I am,” Nick offered.

“And a few inches taller,” Sam said, glancing at Sara. Nick noticed his eyes widen as he faced her.

“And he drives a better car, I take it.” Sara laughed playfully. The small note of mockery in her voice wasn’t lost on Nick. Her hand found his knee. “Lucky I don’t care about things like that. I know what I want when I see it.”

In the rearview mirror, Nick was aware of the deflated look that crossed Sam’s face. Sara’s fingers were teasing his thigh. Stifling the confusion of pride and panic welling inside his chest, he shifted forward and took her hand in his own, shy of taunting his older brother.

The streets were crowded with traffic, but it was flowing smoothly, and they circled down to the ferry landing on the waterfront a couple of minutes later.

Sara took Nick’s hand as they were walking up the hill from the steel and concrete ferry dock on Bainbridge Island into the small village of Winslow. It was a careless gesture, but it sent a spike of pleasure through Nick’s heart. He tried not to show his surprise.

The sun was setting, and the tops of the clouds had turned a soft, golden orange. Across the flat plane of the bay, Seattle glowed, and the fading sun creased its towers with horizontal streaks of electric yellow light, like lines drawn in crayon. Nick and Sara stopped to watch the ferry as it churned the water white in its wake and began its slow glide back across to the city. A flock of seagulls gathered over the ferry, their screeches echoing up the hill. When the ferry blew its deep bass horn, in the aftermath the falling evening felt suddenly quiet.

Nick had taken a number of photographs on the crossing. The ferry had been nearly empty, and he had spent much of the half-hour ride positioning himself to get a few shots over the prow, with Bainbridge Island rising up from the water into the dramatic sunset. The slick from the toxic spill glistened like gasoline in the camera’s frame, in a psychedelic swirl stretching from one side of the bay to the other.

“So what now?” Sara asked, turning away from the sweeping view.

“There’s a small fish shack in town,” Nick said. “It’s not much to look at. It doesn’t even have a name, I don’t think. Maybe you know the place?”

Beneath them, the distant buzz of a car’s engine broke the silence. Nick cataloged the noise but paid no attention to it.

Sara shook her head. “I don’t know Bainbridge very well. When I was little, we always stayed over on the other side of the sound, on Lake Washington.”

The car’s engine was getting louder. The car was climbing the hill, getting closer.

“They serve caviar they bring in from Canada,” Nick said. “The only caviar in Seattle I can afford. I thought maybe you’d like it.”

The car switched on its high beams, carving holes into the fading light. It rounded a switchback curve too fast, its tires squealing. Nick realized how quickly it was approaching when he turned to face it. They were standing in the center of the lane, and he had to grab Sara and yank her out of the way, whipped by the car’s wake. Nick got a look at the driver as he tore past: a sandy-haired man wearing a Hawaiian print shirt.

Sara broke the silence. “I don’t know whether he even saw us,” she said breathlessly.

“He was driving too fast.”

“Well, he missed us.” Sara laughed. “So why don’t you lead me to your fish shack, then,” she said, trying to recover the mood, “Captain Nick.”

Nick held out his arm, and Sara looped her hand beneath his elbow. It didn’t just feel good to Nick, it felt
right
. His skin tingled beneath Sara’s fingers, and almost euphorically, he remembered the sensation of her lips unexpectedly on his, standing at the bus stop next to Sam’s new car.

The small, rustic restaurant was cozy and warm, crowded to capacity, its linen-topped tables laden with plates of freshly grilled fish and frosty glasses of chilled white wine. Coming inside from the crisp evening, Sara stood close to Nick, snuggling up to him as they waited for the hostess. Nick’s temper flared as they were being seated, though, when he noticed the sandy-haired man sitting with a young woman at a table next to the window.

“Don’t let a man like that ruin a beautiful evening,” Sara said to him a few minutes later. She touched Nick on the shoulder, and he noticed that she had poured him a glass of wine. He lifted the glass to his lips, determined to ignore the man and his date.

I should’ve just bought him out
, the man said as the waitress set an icy plate of caviar in the center of the table between Nick and Sara. His voice bellowed through the tiny restaurant.
The opportunity arose, and I coulda had him at a good price.
Nick did his best to block the conversation out. He was aware of the way the man kept staring at Sara, though. His brow was sweaty, and he found himself barely able to control his hatred for the man.

Nick became aware of Sara’s fingers on his forearm. She played with his sleeve, then ran her fingers up toward his bicep, demanding his attention. “Where did you go all of a sudden?” he heard her ask.

He shifted in his chair, taking her in. “Nowhere,” he said, smiling. “I’m right here.”

“So tell me something, Nick.”

Once again, Nick became aware of her fingers on his arm, drawing him into her orbit.

“What did you think when you first saw me this morning?”

Nick raised his eyebrows, surprised by the question.
I thought you were the most beautiful woman I had ever seen
, he wanted to say. “You reminded me of someone,” he said instead.

“An old girlfriend,” she guessed.

“I was just a kid.”

“She was blond, too?”

Nick shrugged.

“What was her name?”

“Elizabeth Munroe. We were neighbors, back in Wisconsin. We grew up together.”

“The girl next door.”

Nick acknowledged the cliché. “I was really young,” he said again.

“Was there any chance you’d say no?”

Nick didn’t understand the question.

“This morning. When I asked you out,” Sara explained. “You hesitated for a couple of seconds before you said yes.”

Nick smiled. He had paused because she had taken his breath away. “I doubt I would have been able to tell you my own name,” he said.

“I thought you were pretty cool. You’d be surprised by some of the reactions I get from men.”

Nick bit his tongue. He wouldn’t have been surprised at all.

“So tell me about Sam—about your brother, I mean.”

Despite himself, Nick felt his shoulders stiffen.
At that price, anyone woulda bought him out. The joker was desperate. In over his head.
Nick felt his eyes sweep across the small restaurant to the man in the Hawaiian shirt.

“Nick?” Sara’s fingers were caressing his arm.

“What do you want to know?”

“Is he jealous of his younger brother?”

“Jealous? Sam?”

“Yeah. He strikes me as the jealous type. You look surprised. Am I wrong?”

“People usually assume it’s the other way around, that’s all.”

“What—that you’re jealous of Sam?”

Nick felt himself flush, uncertain why. He didn’t want to admit to Sara that he might have reason to envy his older brother. “Sure—yeah. He’s always been, well, the successful one. Ever since I can remember, he’s always seemed to know what he wants and how to get it.”

“That doesn’t sound like something to be jealous of,” Sara said. She squeezed Nick’s arm, then took her hand away to take a drink of her wine. Nick swam in her regard. “I’d be jealous of you if I were him,” she said. “After all, you’re the one who got the girl.”

After dinner, realizing they had just twenty minutes before the nine-thirty ferry back to Seattle, they hurried outside. Without warning, Sara grabbed Nick by his hands as they were crossing the gravel parking lot. She pulled him to her and kissed him. Nick drew her body against his, aware of her warmth, aware of the taste of wine on her lips. Her fingers were soft as they found the skin beneath his shirt. And then the moment was interrupted.

Nick heard footsteps on the gravel lot, and the sandy-haired man and his young blond date stepped toward them from the shadows.

The man let a whistle out through his teeth. “Young love,” he said just behind them. “How nice it is.” When Nick broke away from Sara, the man looked him in the eye. “You’re a lucky son of a bitch to get a taste of lips as sweet as that.”

The snow was melting. It was Saturday, and Nick woke up late. He had barely been able to sleep the night before, after waiting up for Elizabeth and then seeing Sam step from her car. He had drifted off that morning with the approach of dawn.

Outside his window on the third floor of the brick house, the sun was shining. Icicles had formed on the eaves, glistening like long slivers of crystal. The window was open a crack, and a breeze was blowing into the room, fresh with the leafy, grassy smell of melting snow. Before anything else, Nick became aware of the silver chain he had bought for Elizabeth around his neck. He had put it on the night before after getting home, deciding to keep it himself as a reminder of his feelings for Elizabeth. It had gotten caught underneath him during his sleep, lightly strangling him. Then the slosh of footsteps three stories beneath him entered his consciousness, followed by the echo of his name being called. He pulled himself out of bed and walked in his boxer shorts to the window. Elizabeth Munroe was outside in her backyard, looking up at the house.

Ten minutes later, Nick was standing with her beneath the low overhang of her parents’ back porch. Her hands were loose on his waist. He was aware of her fingers on his skin. “I’m sorry, Nick,” Elizabeth said. “You have to believe me. I’m sorry.”

Nick was overcome by the depth of her emotion. He ran his fingers through her long blond hair. “But I saw you, Liz,” he said. “Last night, you went to the dance with Sam.”

They had held hands before. But Nick had never been brave enough to kiss her. He liked the way she was leaning into him now. He could feel the swell of her young breasts against his chest. She lifted herself onto her toes, raising her mouth toward his. He could smell her hair.

She crushed her lips against his. His face became wet with her tears. Her fingernails dug into his back. Her hair caught in his mouth. “I’m sorry,” she kept saying. “I don’t want Sam. I want you.”

The ambush took Nick by surprise. Sam had hidden himself behind the birch trees on the front lawn. As Nick headed back home, he leapt out and grabbed hold of Nick’s jacket and slung him backward. The ground was icy, and Nick’s feet slipped underneath him. His back slammed into the side of a tree. Sam grabbed him by his wrists, pinning him. The bark tore into his skin, and the shock of the sudden violence left him winded. He tried to fight back, but Sam was taller and stronger. Nick was barely able to remain on his feet. Sam’s fist landed on his face. He began to fall, but his brother held him up, hitting him again and again, until Nick, at sixteen, his face bruised and bloody, collapsed to the ground, his cheeks wet with blood and tears.

When Sam leaned down toward him, Nick thought that his brother was going to pick him back up. Instead, Sam placed a knee onto his chest and pinned him, then wrapped his hands around Nick’s neck. Nick looked up at him, unable to resist, unable to comprehend, as his brother dug his thumbs into his windpipe and squeezed, choking him. Strangling him. Nick panicked. It felt as if he might suffocate. Still, Sam didn’t let go of him. Not until Nick began to black out. Not until Nick understood that his brother was holding his life in his hands.

“Stay away from her,” Sam growled. “You hear me?” At last, he let Nick go. “Stay the hell away from her.”

Nick swiveled away from Sara, moving without thinking. He was aware of the strength radiating from his arms. An exultant sense of satisfaction shot like a jolt through his body the instant his hands connected with the tweed of the sandy-haired man’s jacket. His fingers tightened around the fabric until the cloth ripped. Nick pulled the man to him, then shoved him backward hard, and the man went sprawling, tumbling into his own parked car before he had time to react.

Sara’s face whitened with shock. She raised a hand to her mouth as Nick leapt onto the man, yanking him up from the ground by the lapels of his jacket and shoving him against the side of his car. The parking lot was filled with the two men’s raspy breathing and the scrape of their footsteps, but neither man uttered a word.

“Hey,” the man’s young date said. “Hey, stop. Stop!”

Nick had the man by the throat, the other hand pressed like a staple into his chest, pinning him to the side of his car. The man’s windpipe felt soft in his hand. The flesh of his neck offered no resistance. Nick’s teeth were clamped together, and the expression on his face didn’t change even when the man began to gasp and then choke.

“Nick, please,” Sara said, trying to separate the two men. Her hands were tugging Nick’s shoulders. “Don’t, Nick. Please, you’ll kill him.”

Slowly, Nick became aware of Sara’s hands pulling at him. He gave the man a final shove, then released him, allowing him to collapse. His girlfriend bent to the man’s side, looking up at Nick in disbelief.

“Come on,” Sara said. She led Nick into the shadows. “Let’s get out of here.”

They were safely on the ferry, Seattle rising up from the dark black plane of the water, before Nick understood what he had done.

When they reached the ferry landing in Seattle, Nick was certain that Sara would make her escape. His hands were still tingling with the sensation of the tweed fabric ripping beneath his fingers as he grabbed the man’s jacket. His jaw hurt. Perhaps the man had taken a swing at him, Nick couldn’t remember. Sara’s voice was still ringing in his ears.
Don’t, Nick. Please, you’ll kill him.
He had frightened her. He had let the man get to him. His temper had gotten the better of him, and no doubt he had scared the hell out of Sara. As he descended the gangway to the dock, downcast, watching her feet, mesmerized by the light step of the Gucci pumps she was wearing, he prepared himself for her good-bye.

Her hand finding his as they touched solid ground came as a complete surprise. He looked into her eyes, then found himself lost once again in the warmth of her kiss. Passion coursed through him with the same intense violence the fight had caused just an hour before.

“I’m so turned on right now,” Sara said. Her voice was a siren’s song in his ear, soft and melodious and seductive. “I want you so much.”

Nick understood that this was happening too fast. They hardly knew one another. All Sara had seen of him so far was a sullen, repressed young man, unable to bridle his fury. But even as this thought passed through his mind, Nick realized that, as elegant and refined as she was, Sara had another side, too. He had to have her. He had to make love to her right here, right now.

He leaned down, and when their mouths met, he bit her lip. His fingers dug into her flesh. He had to restrain himself from holding her so hard that he would hurt her. “I’m sorry,” he said.