The New Neighbor (19 page)

Sometime during the night, he had awakened to find a ghost kneeling beside his bed, groping under the blankets and between his legs.
 

"Let me do it again,” Jen had whispered, as her fingers fumbled for his cock, her face the color of dirty teeth in the sodium glow of the streetlight outside. "I wanna do it again, Robby, okay? Please?"
 

"Go back to bed, Jen," Robby slurred, pulling away from her. "Just ... go.”

"Oh, c'mon, Robby. I promise not to watch
Entertainment Tonight
anymore, okay? I promise. I know how much you hate that show. And ... I know how much you
love
what I want to do to you.”

Robby had cried himself to sleep that afternoon, his bed shaking beneath the uncontrollable sobs that he could not fight. He'd not only been upset by what he'd done, but also by how much he'd
enjoyed
it ... how much he'd enjoyed Jen's hands stroking his cock ... how much he'd enjoyed nuzzling the fine hair between her legs with his nose ...
 

The sobs almost returned as she kneeled beside his bed in the night, reaching for him.
 

"Go
away
!" he'd hissed again and again, pulling the covers up tight around his chin.
 

As Jen left his room, pouting and naked, she'd said something in a sad whisper.
 

What was it?
 

He sat up in bed, trying to remember, trying to wake up. It had seemed important at the time.

Robby crawled out of bed, dressed and got his books. He didn't want to take time to shower or eat breakfast. He had to get out of the house and avoid seeing anyone, if possible. Especially Jen.

Angry voices came from his parents' bedroom. Robby considered pausing outside their door to see what they were fighting about, but didn't want to take the chance of getting caught. In the bathroom, he splashed cold water on his face, brushed his teeth and combed his hair, trying to ignore his hollow, gaunt reflection in the mirror.
 

Jen was curled in the recliner wearing her bathrobe when he passed the living room. She turned and looked at him, her face empty for a moment, then warming suddenly, as if it had taken her a moment to recognize him. Robby stopped in the living room doorway. He wanted to speak to her, to say something that might begin to make up for what he'd done, but his voice was trapped in his constricting throat because –

– Jen's hand was beneath her robe, between her spread legs, moving as she stroked herself and smiled at him with her brows raised high above her heavy-lidded eyes, and –

– Robby suddenly remembered her words as she left his room the night before, spoken in a breathy whisper full of disappointment.
She said you'd pay
more
attention to me
.

He hurried out of the house and into the cold drizzle, lifting his face to the gray sky as he crossed the grass. He breathed deeply as the chilly moisture sprinkled his face.

Robby's foot kicked something and he stopped, looked down. Four newspapers were scattered at the edge of the lawn where they always landed when the paperboy threw them each day. They were wrapped in plastic because of the weather, but two of the wrappers had torn and the papers inside were soaked.
 

Four days of newspapers. It was always delivered early, before Robby went to school, so one of them was probably today's, Tuesday's. Dad usually brought it in and read it over breakfast.

He hadn't since Saturday.
 

He hasn't been feeling good
, Robby thought as he stepped across the sidewalk and onto the street.
He just hasn't thought about it, that's all
.
 

Across the street, there were lights on behind the curtains of Lorelle's windows. She seemed to be a very early riser despite the late hours she kept.
 

She never sleeps
.
 

The mailbox was full of mail. The aluminum door hung open a couple of inches and the corners of wet envelopes, sales papers and advertisement flyers stuck out of the box.

Robby stopped and stared at the box, pulled it all the way open and looked in at the sopping stack of mail, all of it ruined.
He
usually brought in the mail, and if he didn't, it usually occurred to
someone
eventually.
 

It had occurred to no one.
 

Frowning, Robby walked on. Jessie sat in the middle of the road, head hung low, her tail curled beneath her rump.
 

"Hey, Jess," Robby called, but his voice was hoarse and flat.
 

The dog's head lowered even more and her tail twitched cautiously over the pavement. Her fur was wet and slicked to her body.
 

Robby walked over to the dog and patted her head. "What're you doing out here, Jess, huh? How come you're not inside?"
 

Dylan usually let Jessie into the garage at night, especially if it was raining. But Dylan had been sick, too. Maybe he'd forgotten.

But why wouldn't his parents do it?
Robby wondered.
 

Jessie hunkered down close to the pavement with a whine, looking up at Robby fearfully, as if he were about to strike her.
 

Robby bent down to pet her, murmuring, "What's the matter, Jessie? Huh? What's – “
 

She pressed her chin to the ground and whined again, clenching her eyes shut.
 

Robby heard someone shouting behind him, a voice muffled by distance and walls. He stood slowly and turned back toward the Garry's house, the last house on the left, as glass shattered. Another voice joined in, both shouting at once. The front door opened, then slammed. Mrs. Garry stalked across the grass to the car parked in the drive, got in and slammed the door. After starting the engine, she revved it and popped the clutch. The car shot backward into the street and turned until the headlights faced Robby.

"C'mon, Jess," Robby said, slapping his thigh as he backed toward the sidewalk.
 

Mrs. Garry shifted gears and the car kicked forward.
 

"Jessie, come
on
."
 

The dog remained in the middle of the street, hunched down like a frightened child.
 

Robby whistled, made kissing sounds with his lips, and kept slapping his leg as he called, "C'mere, Jess, c'mon, Jessie-girl, come here.”

The car's speed increased and Mrs. Garry's eyes stared straight ahead as if they saw nothing in her path.
 

Robby dropped his books, bolted forward and clutched Jessie's fur, dragging her over the pavement. The dog wailed horribly, pulling her head away from him, as if dodging a blow. Her black claws scraped over the road as Robby heaved her toward the sidewalk, his weakened arms trembling with the effort, his head pounding. The dog suddenly gave a sharp bark and clambered to her feet, jumping onto the sidewalk as Mrs. Garry roared by in her car, eyes front, mouth moving rapidly, angrily, flashing teeth as she shouted silently at no one.
 

Robby watched her run the stop sign at the intersection and take a squealing left turn. He bent to give Jessie a reassuring pat, but the dog scrambled away with a yelp, trotting down the street. Robby stood on the sidewalk, numbed by what had just happened.
 

Winona Garry was one of the most easy-going even-tempered persons he'd ever known. Robby couldn't believe she'd nearly run over him and her own dog.

He stared at the Garry house for a moment. It looked dead. Empty. Apparently Dylan was still sick. He was usually out by now, heading for the bus stop with Robby.
 

Still sick
, Robby thought.
Like everybody else.
 

Moving slowly, trembling from his exertion, Robby picked up his books from the wet pavement, tried to dry them off with his jacket sleeve, then started toward the bus stop again, so disturbed that he was mumbling to himself, trying to sort out what had just happened. He noticed that the Crane's mailbox, like his own, was stuffed with days of mail. Robby stopped to peek into the box at the soggy stack.
 

There were three plastic wrapped newspapers in the driveway. One of them was beneath the left rear tire of Al's Mazda.

Not a whole lot of interest in the mail or the paper these days
, Robby thought.

The LaBianco's weren't interested in theirs, either. And coming from inside their small house, Robby could hear Mr. LaBianco's normally quiet voice raising to an angry roar.
 

Sheri MacNeil's porch light was still on and all her curtains were closed. She was usually at her kitchen window by now, waving at passing children as she made breakfast and watched
Good Morning America
on the small television on her kitchen table.

But when he stopped again and looked around, Robby realized there were no children passing her house. There were a few standing at the intersection, waiting for the bus, but not half as many as usual. And they were so
quiet
.

He walked on slowly, facing front, but looking out the corners of his eyes at the strange sights that only a longtime resident of the neighborhood would notice – more mailboxes stuffed with neglected mail, more ignored newspapers scattered on lawns and driveways, a small jagged hole in the front window of the Petrie house, no loud rock music coming from Donald Gundy's bedroom window as he got ready for school.

Robby walked to the intersection and stood behind the Crane twins and two other children. The twins were talking softly between themselves; the other two were silent.

"I thought you were sick," Robby said.
 

"We are," Dana said, facing the street and sounding cranky.
 

"Sorta." Tara's voice was gentler, almost a whisper. "But we're better."
 

"Shouldn't you stay home until you're well?"
 

Tara said, "Mom wants us out of the house for the day. She's ... in a bad mood."
 

"So's Dad," Dana snapped.

Robby hesitated, not wanting to sound nosy, then asked, "How come?"
 

"I think they're sick, too," Tara said. "But mostly, I think they're fighting."
 

He wanted to ask why, but the bus rumbled off of Victor Avenue and slowed to a stop at the curb and the children climbed aboard.
 

Robby stood alone on the corner hugging his books –

–
The flu? Is that what you've got
? –

– feeling a chill that had nothing to do with the weather –

–
Yeah, that's what we thought it was. But I know better now
–

– and listening to the sound of his own bus in the distance –

–
Because I don't think the flu would make my wife take a chainsaw to her son. Or to me
–

– as it neared the corner. It would stop, the doors would hiss open, and the driver would wait for Robby to get on, then it would take him to school, where he would be expected to forget the deeply disturbing feeling of
wrongness
that he felt now, and concentrate, for six hours, on teachers and books. He spun around and hopped over the small shrubs that ran along the front of the Holcombs' yard, then ducked behind the fence that faced Mistletoe until the bus came. It slowed at the abandoned corner, then picked up speed and rolled on down the lane.

Robby left the Holcombs' yard and started down Mistletoe. Although he wasn’t going to school that day, he couldn't go back home, either. There was something else he had to do.

* * * *

When the telephone rang Ronald Prosky was lying in bed in his room at the Motel 6 on Hilltop Drive, thinking about sleep.

That was about the best he could do these days –
think
about sleep. For nearly a year after the loss of his wife and son, there had been no nightmares. In spite of his grief, he had other things to think about, like the surgical reconstruction of his face (for all the good it had done) and adjusting to his prosthetic arm. Then, after his life settled down a bit, Marie and Gordon had come back to haunt his sleep. Each time he drifted off, he saw them naked in bed together ... and then he saw them bloody and dead. He heard his son's screams and smelled the gasoline vapors from the buzzing chainsaw, felt his own warm blood on his face and tasted it in his mouth and he saw his right arm lying on the bedroom floor. And worst of all, he saw
her
, again and again.
 

Now he couldn't even fall asleep long enough to
have
a nightmare. He was afraid to sleep, not because he would relive his family's death, but because he knew
she
was near.
 

She was working differently now. The people who lived on Deerfield had changed in a matter of days. It usually took months before the changes in her victims became visible, then a couple of months after that before they became violent. In less than a week, the Pritchard boy had taken on the gaunt, pale look that usually overcame one of her victims after three months or so of seductive teasing and careful priming.
 

She was working much faster now, as if driven by something to finish here in Redding and move onto the next neighborhood ... or apartment building ... or mobile home complex ... anyplace where families lived in reasonable contentment and safety.
 

It could begin at any moment, the torture and killing, and there was nothing Prosky could do to stop her. Unless –
 

The phone rang.
 

Prosky sat up on the bed, hoping it was the Pritchard boy; that he'd decided, for whatever reason, to help Prosky.

"Hello."
 

"Um ... hi. It's me. The guy you talked to yesterday? At school? My name's Robby."