Imola (7 page)

Agnes didn’t have to wait long. Stuart burst out of his door and shuffled into the Day Room. He scanned the room, locked his gaze on Patty, and lurched toward her. She was ready. She deflected his arms and shoved him aside. He nearly went over, bracing himself against the wall. He came at her again, and again she pushed his arms, partially spinning him, and pushed him at the wall. His shoulder hit this time.

Stuart kicked at her, and she dodged his foot. He faked another lurch, she reacted, and he slipped behind her. His left arm went around her neck, and his right hand thrust down the front of her jumpsuit. He fondled her, hard.

Patty gave him an elbow in the ribs, and his hand came out of her suit. Another elbow, higher, caught him just under the armpit. He let go of her neck. She pushed him back against the wall, and he froze.

“You bitch. I’m going to get you.” He looked around the room. “I’m going to get all of you. You won’t know which one first. You won’t know when. But I’m going to get you all.”

Agnes didn’t notice right away, but Milo McGuinn was on his feet. And he was walking—fast. Faster than she had ever seen him walk. He still lifted his feet high and jiggled them at the apex of each step, and it produced a goose walk that reminded her of the Monty Python skit, “Ministry of Silly Walks.” He approached Stuart.

“Keep your hands off the girls, or I’ll—”

Stuart hit him square in the chest with his fist.

Milo didn’t flinch. Not even an eye blink. He looked down at his chest and then at Stuart, who seemed shocked.

Milo smiled, then reached past Stuart’s left shoulder and brushed off the adjacent wall with his hand. He waved it over the plaster from head-height down halfway to the floor, then stepped back and smiled at Stuart again.

This time Stuart smiled back.

Milo grabbed Stuart by the shoulders and moved him a step to the left and then slammed him into the now microbe-free wall. He pulled him back and slammed him again. Stuart’s head hit hard on the second slam. His eyes gushed tears.

Milo held his left leg out straight, at a forty-five-degree angle, and shook it so hard the bell clapper couldn’t keep up with the casing. He returned his foot to the floor, slightly overlapping Stuart’s right leg. A shove and Stuart fell across his leg and onto the floor right under the spot where Milo had shaken his foot.

Stuart crumpled on the floor. “You’re a bitch, too,” he shouted between sobs. “Only fairy bitches don’t eat meat.”

Milo bent down close to Stuart’s face. “That’s right. I don’t eat meat. But I’ll eat a plateful on the day you go to hell.”

April ran her fingers down Jason’s bare chest, drawing a circle in the light mat of hair. The glisten of sweat gave his skin a luminescent tone, still nearly hot to the touch. His chest heaved with each breath like he was fighting the oxygen debt from their sharing. His eyes were closed but not to sleep. Contentment, she hoped.

April reached to the adjacent nightstand and removed a stick of gum from an open pack. She let the wrapper fall next to the lamp base and shoved the stick between her teeth. Her jaw worked up to speed.

She didn’t want to come right out and ask it, but she didn’t want the moment to pass either, just in case her intuition was on the mark. He was too easy to spook. On the other hand, it had been only a week since his last visit.

She traced another circle, and he let out a purring exhalation. She leaned up on her elbow. “Jason, why don’t we ever go to your place?”

He frowned without opening his eyes. “Hmmm?”

“Why is it always here? Are you embarrassed about your apartment?”

One eye opened, accompanied by a feeble shake of his head. “What are you talking about?”

She leaned over, close to him. “Why don’t you have me over?”

The other eye opened, and the furrow in his forehead wrinkled to a chasm. “I thought women were only comfortable on their own turf. You know, avoid the walk of shame thing.”

She poked him in the ribs. “Maybe you just like the walk of fame.”

His flinch pulled him to the edge of the bed. He rolled, facing away, and pushed her hand away from his side. “What’s with the weird questions?”

“I was just wondering if you were embarrassed about your apartment.”

He pulled the covers up to his chin. “No. Now tell me what you really want.”

Her face went hot, so she pushed her head into the pillow and reached for his neck, caressing the hairline. “Nothing. I was just thinking.” She felt his jaw tighten.

“Thinking about what?”

She ran her thumb along his jaw line. “I don’t know. You. Me. Us. What we have.”

She felt him smile. He turned his head and kissed her thumb.

Leaning up, she moved her hand back to his neck and gave a little squeeze. His eyes opened. “Well?”

His head jerked a little. “Well, what?”

“What do we have?”

He rolled on his back, sliding her hand to the front of his neck. “You’re important to me.”

“Your coffeemaker is important to you. I’d like to know if I’m more than an appliance in your life.”

No movement. “Don’t be silly.”

She pulled his chin toward her. “Move in with me. Here.” She almost said it’d be cheaper, but she caught herself.

His expression didn’t change. And still no movement. She couldn’t even feel his breathing, which was so forced only moments ago.

Finally, he blinked. “I don’t think—”

“Shit.” She fell back into her pillow and covered her face with her hands. She peeked between her fingers.

Elbowing his pillow, he balanced his head on his hand. “You wouldn’t like the life of an investigative reporter. And now that I’m working for the Press Democrat and the Chronicle, I get calls at all hours. I have to pick up and run with every one of them.”

“I’m sure that’s it.” Her voice was muffled in her palms.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I think you’re afraid of commitment.”

No response. She peeked through her fingers again. His stare seemed to penetrate her screen. It was no time to cower. She had played the hand. Now it was time to lay down the cards—see what he had. She lowered her hands. “Are you? Afraid?”

“Yes.” His stare continued, but his focus seemed to change.

The gape of her mouth let a quiet gurgle escape. His response was the last she expected—so distant from her mental calculation of possible outcomes. She was speechless. In fact, to her, it was possibly a male first. The shrine on Mount Manhood had probably just lost one of its pillars.

Was he serious, or was this a clever way to derail the charging locomotive? At the least, he’d managed to pull the lever and force a track change.

He shifted over so his face was within a few inches of hers, just above and to the side. “You know I was engaged before, right?”

She exhaled.

“I was in love with her. I’m sure of it. All of the indications she gave—I was sure she was in love with me, too. We set a date. She picked out plates and silverware. I even ordered the invitations. Then I couldn’t get her to complete her list of guests. She didn’t change howshe treated me. She just couldn’t complete the list. I thought she was worried about the size of the reception. The cost.” He paused.

April looked for signs of emotion on Jason’s face, but it was blank, as if he were talking from another plane. She wanted to pull him to her, to comfort him, but she didn’t want him back yet. She wanted to hear more. The wait was short.

“She had good reason to worry about the guest list. She’d met someone else. The only problem was that she met this someone else more than a year before, and she got around to telling me when I had half the invitations addressed and stamped.” He blinked back to the bed. “I was in love. Trouble was, so was she. Once it was all out, she was gone faster than a lightning bolt finds ground, and it left me death-shocked.”

All April could manage was a feeble, “I’m sorry.”

His return was brief; his eyes drifted again. “Now I know the depth of vulnerability when a man gives his heart to a woman unconditionally.” His eyes snapped back; they seemed almost angry. “Excuse me if I’m gun shy. I don’t want to feel that vulnerable right now. Maybe never.”

Her mouth jumped ahead of her brain. “So it isn’t Agnes, then?”

“What?” His face crinkled like a wadded piece of paper.

April tried to shrink into the pillow. Her voice loweredto blend with its softness. “I thought maybe you were in love with Agnes, and that’s why—”

“Why are you always so worried about Agnes?”

“I’m not—”

“Physician, heal thyself.”

She reached back, pulled her pillow from under her head, and swung it into the side of his.

He grabbed it and pulled so hard she collapsed against his chest, her head against his cheek. Before she could react, he wrapped his arms around her. “Don’t push. Okay? I’m not a hopeless case. Just a helpless one. Can you be patient?”

“I don’t know. I don’t want to be … with you.”

“Would it help if we met at my place next time?”

She smiled and slipped down to nuzzle his neck. “It’s not necessary. It’s enough you offered. You know, the walk-of-shame thing.”

His hand slid down her back, then up again. His light touch turned into a grip on her shoulder.

She leaned her head back. “What’s the matter?”

“I want to ask something, but the timing sucks. You’ll take it wrong.”

“If it’s about Agnes, you’re right.”

He didn’t say anything.

“Shit,” she said. “You know how to spoil a moment, don’t you?”

“I just want a professional opinion. That’s all.”

“Why now?”

“When else can I ask?”

“Come around more often,” she said.

He slid toward the edge of the bed.

She grabbed him around the waist. “I’m sorry. I admit it. I’m jealous. You always bring her up. Sometimes I think—”

“List the things we have in common,” he said. “No matter how long the list is, Agnes is on it, right near the top. Without her, we wouldn’t have found each other.”

“That’s supposed to help?”

“Right now, she needs a friend more than ever. What kind of turd would you think I was if I deserted her?”

April thought about answering.

“I’ll never deny that I care about her. I want her to get better. That should be another of our common points. I don’t understand what’s wrong with her, and I want to. I want to help, and it seems my visits do that.”

April went rigid. “You want an opinion of what’s wrong with her?”

“Yes.”

“Professional opinion?”

“Yes.”

She propped her pillow against the headboard, leaned against it, and raised the blanket just above her breasts. “How much do you know about how our minds process reality and our own identity?”

He leaned on his elbow, propping his chin with his palm. The look on his face was like that of a dog awaiting a treat. “Sounds like I’m about to get a mixture of psychology and philosophy. I know a little about both.”

“Have you ever heard of the Global Phenomenal Model of Reality?”

He bobbed his head. “You know, I was just discussing it with my barber the other day.”

“Was your barber real, or was he someone your mind invented?”

“He talked to me, touched me, cut my hair. My hair was shorter when I left, and some of it littered his floor.”

“How do you know you didn’t blank out, cut your own hair, and imagine the whole thing?”

“I just know. I’ve done the same thing dozens of times.”

April smiled. “So, over your lifetime, you’ve developed a set of experiences, and all of the events from your barber visit coincided with your experiences, right?”

“You could say it that way.”

“How about if I said it like this: Similarities between observations and experience make the event seem real.”

His eyes didn’t stray. “That sounds logical.”

“Then, let’s take the logic one step further,” April said. “The greater the details of the observations, and the stronger their coherence with experiences, the more real the event appears. How’s that?”

“I’m still with you.”

“So, what happens when an event is extremely detailed, but it goes against all of your experience and your perceived order of the world?”

“Like what?”

“What if you had an experience so horrific it didn’t fit any of your accumulated experiences, and it fell well outside of accepted limits of your perception of civilized society? What if your barber suddenly slashed the throat of a customer and began eating his neck flesh? Would that fit your concept of reality?”

He shook his head. “More like surreal. But if it happened in front of me, I’d justify it as an anomaly.”

“But what if it kept happening every time you went to the barber? Over and over again?”

“I guess I’d have to find a way to accept it as reality and deal with it.”

April shifted under the sheets. “What if it was totally unacceptable? Unacceptable, yet real?”

“I’d have to find a way to put it out of my mind. Maybe pretend it wasn’t happening.”

“So now, picture yourself as a little girl. You’ve been raised in a family situation with a father who has nurtured and protected you. But then, something happens with your father that is so unexpected and so horrible that it defies your experience-defined basis of reality. And it keeps happening over and over.”

Jason shivered. “I’d find a way to adapt. How did Agnes do it?”

“When experiences get too tough for her, she with-draws—blanks out. She calls herself ‘No One.’ As far as I can tell, she totally escapes. She stops observing. Her emotions succumb to the logic of survival. She doesn’t have any memory of the events. But there are memories in there somewhere. That’s what I’m going after.”

“You think that’s the solution? Get her to remember? What if that traumatizes her further?”

“If she’s going to deal with her problems, she has to face them.”

Jason sat up. He pulled the bedsheet above his waist. “How does Lilin fit in? Is she Agnes’s way of adapting?”

“Not really. I think Lilin’s more of a consequence.”

“Now you’re losing me.”

“It has to do with how we process our own identity. You think of yourself in the first person, right?”