Twelve Nights (21 page)

“Let’s go to bed and work things out there,” Jimmy suggested
to see what she would do. His answer was a stricken but mute appeal. He took
pity. “No, maybe you should just go back to the hotel and get a good night’s
sleep.”

“Thank you,” she whispered. She looked almost ready to
collapse in relief. Jimmy’s pity hardened as he pictured the long empty night
ahead.

“Banish this cool Aggie,” he warned Angela. “Send the
hot-tempered one tomorrow.”

“Or else?” Angela challenged.

Jimmy admired her guts.

“Or else the contract’s off,” he stated. “I’m sure Richard
can find a clause to void the agreement, given your persistent non-performance.”

If Jimmy had wanted to rattle Angela, he had succeeded. He
wondered whether her ebbing color came more from the threatened loss of the
contract or from his mention of her last night’s companion. For Richard’s sake,
he hoped it was the latter. Whichever, Angela quickly recovered herself.

“My non-performance, as you put it, has been with your
agreement,” she asserted.

Suddenly Jimmy was tired of the game, the deception.

“Go back to the hotel, …”

He had almost said ‘Angela’. Time to get her out of the
apartment before he slipped. He helped her into her coat. A few minutes later
as he handed her into the taxi, he debated telling her everything. He could go
back with her to the hotel, find the real Aggie and bring her to the apartment.
But no, he would give the schemers one more night, one more chance to come
clean. If Aggie didn’t come tomorrow night, if she didn’t confess to the whole
devious plot … Jimmy’s thoughts stalled. What would he do? He would love her
anyway, he realized. Right after he strangled her.

Somehow, miraculously, they had made it through seven nights
of the contract. Aggie woke on the eighth morning with that thought foremost in
her mind. She lay with her eyes still closed and listened to Angela’s breathing
on the second bed. Andrew had been granted the sofa. Five more nights, she
thought. She drew in a deep breath and then remembered to be surprised that she
could breathe. Her flu must have finally broken.

Aggie checked herself internally. Her stomach rumbled with
hunger. A good sign. Her eyes were heavy with sleep but at least they didn’t
burn with fever. Aggie swallowed. Easy. No lump, no rasp. She could go to Jimmy
tonight. They could sleep together. Aggie smiled when she remembered the scope
that simple word covered. She doubted they would really sleep at all.

Angela had told her of Jimmy’s suspicions, that he thought
she had a dual personality. In a way, his misperception made their deception
easier. Aggie felt a pang of remorse for deceiving him, but after all, this was
a man who thought he could buy a woman. He deserved a trick or two with his
treats. She would play along, maybe even agree to see a psychiatrist, then she
would screw his brains off till he didn’t even remember the offer. Her smile
broadened as she opened her eyes.

Drat. She heard Andrew snore in the living room. Her young
former lover would have to go. She wondered how she had ever thought herself in
love with him. He was sweet, but he wasn’t even a man yet. Someday he’d fall
for a cute little redhead and they’d make adorable babies together. Aggie’s
exasperation faded with the picture. She hated to just dump him on his ass. He
really was sweet.

Aggie slid out of bed, pulled her bathrobe around her and
padded to the restroom. When she opened the bathroom door a few minutes later,
she sniffed the air. Coffee. Somebody else was awake.

“Hi!” Andrew greeted her as she walked into the tiny
kitchen. He kissed her on the forehead.

“Morning breath,” he explained. “Do you want to go out for
breakfast?”

“How did you know I wasn’t Angela?” Aggie asked.

“You let me kiss you,” Andrew answered with a grin. “She
would have walked back into the bedroom the minute she saw me.”

“Is she that bad?” Aggie asked. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Andrew replied, then his male ego butted in.
“She’s probably jealous.”

Aggie almost laughed. Instead she took too large a swallow
of coffee and burned her mouth.

“Do you want to go out to breakfast?” Andrew repeated,
oblivious to her agony as she spit the hot liquid into the sink.

“No,” Aggie glared then she relented. “Why don’t you go to
the bakery and get us some cinnamon rolls?”

“Sounds good to me,” Andrew agreed. “I’ll get some bagels
for Angela. Can you lend me some money?”

Andrew’s impecuniousness had never bothered Aggie before.
Now his dependence nearly drove her up the wall. Still, he had remember the
bagels for Angela. Aggie dug in her purse and pulled out a colorful bill.

“What’s that one?” she asked.

“I think it’s a ten.” Andrew examined the paper closely and
found the numeral. “Yup. Ten ought to do it. I’ll be right back.”

Aggie took her almost drinkable coffee into the living room.

“When are you going to tell the boy wonder to go home?”
Angela’s sleepy voice drifted out of the bedroom. She was awake.

“Don’t call him the boy wonder,” Aggie called back. “He’s
twenty-five.”

“A baby.” Angela wandered into the room scratching her hair.
“I need a shower.”

Aggie’s twin filled a mug and brought her coffee into the
living room where she sat on the sofa.

“I thought you wanted a shower,” Aggie commented.

“Coffee first,” Angela explained. “So I won’t drown.”

“It’s going to work after all, isn’t it Boo?” Aggie couldn’t
quite dampen the hope in her voice. Five nights with Jimmy. She would think
about the sixth night later.

“Cross your fingers,” Angela agreed. “You have to tell the
boy wonder to go.”

“His name is Andrew. He’s getting you bagels.”

“Maybe he can stay. I’ll call him bagel boy.” The twins
laughed.

By the time Andrew returned, Aggie was in the shower. Angela
convinced him for a few minutes that she was her twin. When he tried to put his
hand up her sweater, she called a halt to the charade. Aggie emerged hot and
clean to a sulking young ex-boyfriend who didn’t know it yet.

Angela left with their father and Mary to the conservatory
at Queen Elizabeth Park. Aggie spent the morning listening to Andrew’s
complaints about her sister. She finally took him in desperation to Science
World, really a child’s amusement, but he was fascinated by the ingenious displays.
Aggie found her interest caught despite herself and spent a pleasant afternoon
learning about acoustics and dinosaurs. She dragged Andrew out and back to the
hotel at five o’clock. Zero hour approached.

Without explanation, she left Andrew alone in the living
room at 5:30 and disappeared into the bedroom. When she emerged dressed in a
short tight jean skirt and a long pale peach sweater, her resolution was firm.
She would tell him now that he had to go back to Cincinnati, that their
association was through. As she turned the corner into the living room, she saw
that Andrew had fallen asleep on the sofa. She breathed a sigh of relief and
guilt and left him a note on the coffee table. She couldn’t tell him to leave
in a note, so the words just read,
Be
back later. Don’t worry.

Don’t worry. She repeated the words to herself like a mantra
as she directed the taxi this way and that. The charade of a roundabout cab
drive seemed redundant at this stage, but Angela still hoped to keep their
hotel location a secret. Aggie secretly suspected that their father had already
spilled the beans to his seawall friend Jimmy. Jimmy. Mmmm. Aggie leaned back
into the seat and imagined the coming evening.

Jimmy waited inside the lobby as Aggie had expected, but
with him was another man. The stranger was almost a dead ringer for photographs
Aggie had seen of Sigmund Freud, tall, thin and stooped with a sad knowing face
and a pipe. Either Freud or Sherlock Holmes without his hat. Jimmy opened the
door for Aggie and then introduced them.

“Aggie, this is Dr. Topas. Dr. Topas, Aggie Trout.”

Aggie shook the offered hand. Something about the name
niggled at her memory.

Jimmy kept up a stream of small talk as they entered the
elevator. Aggie thought furiously. Ha, she remembered in triumph as they
stopped at the apartment floor. I’ve read Shakespeare, too. Sir Topas was the
name of the false monk in
Twelfth Night.
Twelve nights? She silently saluted Jimmy’s ingenuity and resolved to play the
game to the hilt.

“Dr. Topas is a specialist in multiple personality
disorders,” Jimmy explained as he helped Aggie out of her coat. She nodded
solemnly. He had the wrong term, but it was a good stab. “I’d like you to talk
to him. Maybe we can banish the second personality forever.”

“Which one do you want to keep?” she asked innocently.

“The one that’s here now,” Jimmy answered without
hesitation. Aggie was glad he somehow knew. “Let’s all sit in the library.”

Aggie and Dr. Topas followed Jimmy into the book filled
room. Aggie saw the bogus doctor’s eyes caress the wealth of books. An
academic, perhaps? She wondered how Jimmy had persuaded him into the charade.
Jimmy seated Aggie under a light and placed the doctor and himself in shadow.
He waved for the doctor to begin. Aggie sank back into her chair. This should
be fun.

“Aggie,” the doctor began. “Do you mind if I call you
Aggie?”

“Please do.”

“Aggie, I want you to think back to your childhood.”

Aggie closed her eyes and pretended to remember. In reality
she was trying to dream up a barely plausible tale.

“You are twelve years old Aggie,” the soothing voice said.
“Tell me about where you live.”

This was easy.

“We live in a big old house in a small town in Alabama.”
There were hundreds of small Alabama towns. Jimmy would never figure out which
one she meant. “The house was built in the 1890’s. It has wood floors and high
ceilings and a huge attic.”

Aggie stopped talking. She had almost added ‘where my twin
and I used to play.’ She had better be careful. The doctor seemed undisturbed
by her silence.

“Back up to eight years old, Aggie. Where do you live now?”

“The same house, but it seems even bigger.” Aggie
congratulated herself. ‘Even bigger’ was a nice touch. She had done regression
therapy before and knew the right buttons. Aggie slit open one eye and saw the
doctor nod happily to Jimmy. The two frauds. I’ll give them something to nod
about. She began to moan. “Oh, ooohhh…”

“What is it?” the doctor asked.

“Ooohhh…” Aggie groaned.

Jimmy took her hand and shook it lightly.

“I have a tummy ache,” she groaned.

“She must have gotten sick when she was eight,” the doctor
explained. They didn’t think their regression was really working, did they?
Aggie almost laughed but instead she stopped groaning and began to giggle.

“Dada,” she gurgled trying her best to sound like a
preverbal baby. “Goo-goo. Agga waana ookie.”

She was afraid she had gone too far. Jimmy’s fingers
tightened on her hand.

“Doctor,” he exclaimed dramatically. “You’ve regressed her
to a baby!”

Aggie knew now that he was on to her and that they were somehow
together pulling a fast one on the bogus doctor.

“Oogle, oogle, ooo,” she babbled.

“Bring her back!” Jimmy’s voice was near hysteria.

“You’re ten now,” the doctor said frantically. “Now you’re
twelve. You’re twenty now, Aggie. We’re back in the present.”

Aggie allowed the baby smile to fade slowly from her face.
When she opened her eyes she almost lost her composure as she looked into
Jimmy’s laughing orbs. She swallowed her giggles and turned to the doctor.

“You’ve cured me!” she cried and jumped out of her chair.
She ran and knelt at his feet, wrapping her arms around his legs. The man
looked like he might have a heart attack. Then Jimmy’s laughter bellowed forth.
The sound filled the room and drew Aggie and the doctor’s eyes together. He
figured it out. His tenor laugh and Aggie’s giggles melted into Jimmy’s low
fading chuckle.

“You know there are two of us,” Aggie accused Jimmy a few
minutes later as the three sat over coffee in the kitchen. He nodded. “How did
you figure it out?”

“Looks aren’t everything,” Jimmy shrugged.

“And this charade was to get me to admit it,” Aggie pushed
on.

“Aggie Trout, meet Dr. Jeremy Gladstone.”

“You really are a doctor?” Aggie asked.

“Of anthropology,” Jeremy admitted.

“How did Jimmy convince you…”

“To play the role?” Jeremy finished her sentence. “Jimmy and
I go back a long way.”

“You look a lot like Freud,” Aggie commented.

“Less without the mustache.” Jeremy pulled it off. “Damn
itchy thing. Well, I’d better push off now.”

Jimmy and Aggie both stood and walked with Jeremy to the
door. He shook hands first with Jimmy and then with her.

“I’m glad we met,” he offered.

“Me too.”

“I’m sure I’ll see you again.”

“I hope so.”
But I
doubt it,
she added silently. However wonderful the next five nights might
be, Aggie had no illusions that they would continue beyond the contract. She
would have to make enough memories to last a long time. As the door closed, she
locked her fists into Jimmy’s shirtfront and pulled him to her. “You’re a
demon. Dr. Topas indeed.”

“I should have guessed you’d know your Shakespeare, witch.”

Jimmy kissed her hard and then lifted her by her locked
elbows. He carried her rigid in front of him to the bedroom and plopped her on
the bed. He whipped off his clothes and stood naked and challenging before her.
She let her eyes roam over his middle-aged bulges and bumps as he preened like
a body builder at the side of the bed. His cock rose from limp to half mast to
fully engaged.

“Come take me, you gorgeous thing,” she called to him when
the inflation was complete.