On Tenterhooks (5 page)

The
stranger
tinkled the needless together on each hand. They chimed in time with the
rhythm
of his hands.

“No!” screamed Martin, crying
.
He
pushed
himself
up
to crawl toward her again.

The stranger
turned and stepped up on the balls of his feet
.
He sucked in air through pursed lips
, raising
his arms wide
,
like a giant bird of prey stretching his wings to take flight. W
ith the
grace
of a dancer
, he
held
his arms
up in the air above
Maggie
, tinkling the massive needles again
.
Maggie’s
eyes followed the
movement above her,
but she
remained still.
The
stranger
cackled once and plunged all of his finger needles into the soft flesh of her
belly, t
hrough her shirt, through her skin and through her bone.

“
Maggie
!” Martin cried
.
From
behind,
he felt an iron grip
pick him up by his left ankle and
fling
him
through the doorway into the wall
.
Darkness.

Martin woke up in his bathroom, sweat-drenched and sobbing.
He was lying sideways in
his
bathtub
.
Every time, it was the same dream
.
Every time, he could see
Maggie
there, in pain,
but he could never reach her
.
Every time
, he felt like he’d been there before
.
But
during
the dream,
Martin
couldn’t remember what happened next or that
he’d
ever witnessed the scene
.
Each time it played through his
mind,
it was new and
just as
terrifying
as the last
.
When he
woke, he
’d be
aching, sobbing and somewhere other than his bed
.

The dreams were frequent
—
twice in the past
week
.
Maggie
had died nearly two months ago yet the dreams remained persistent and painful
.
Martin
could only guess
at the details of the
accidental overdose that took
Maggie’s
life on that Friday night. Beyond that, he chalked the horror of the dream up to the stress and the pain of losing his only child
.

Chapter
5

“Guess what?  I forgot to tell you
!
  You know Martin, the pharmacist
I was telling you about
?
”

Pause.

“
Yeah,
the one
whose
daughter just died
.
Well get this
—
I have to help him do the pharmacy inventory next weekend
.
”

Pause.

“
I know. It
totally sucks!
”

That’s all Martin could hear
through the thin walls
of the break room at the back of the
pharmacy
as
Tina, one of the
store’s
cascade of teen cashiers
,
talked
on her cell phone
.

“I’m
gonna miss the Atomic Raisin concert on Saturday, and I heard today that Shopping Maul was gonna be a special guest
.
This totally
blows
.
I
love them
,
and now I don’t
even get to
see the show!  I’d blow off this inventory thing
,
but I think
he’d
have me fired or something
.
He used to be pretty cool, but lately he’s all grumpy all the time.
”

Martin was sitting on a stool,
sorting capsules
on
a
tray
,
while his assistant
,
Kathie
,
stood near the cash register waiting for customers.
He shook his head as he tried to concentrate on his work rather than Tina’s cellular rant.
Kathie turned to face him. He sighed, but continued counting.

“
Funny how expecting people to work
for
their pay and stick with a job makes me ‘
grumpy’
these days
,”
said Martin, more to himself than to Kathie
.

The rosy cheeks on
Kathie’s
full face
lifted in a smile.

“Ignore it
,
Martin
.
She’s an idiot
.
Teenagers are all idiots
.
Remember how bad I had
it with Roy when he got into
high
school?”
She continued
without waiting for an answer.
“That boy
was hell on wheels
!
And then when he got his driver’s license?  Lordie! I thought we were done for!  Staying out late, drinking beer and shooting his .
410
down by the river?  My God, him and his daddy
a
bout came to blows several times!”

She chuckle
d and
then sighed, shaking her head
.
Martin smiled at the story he had heard a dozen times before, continuing to count the pills.

“Yes sir, he was trouble. They all are!
” she lamented.

She paused, lost in years past.

“He grew out of it though,” she continued. “We’re so proud of him now
.
College degree, good job
.
You
’ll see Martin,
as soon as
Mag
gie
. . .
”

She stopped short and sucked in air the way she always did when she was flustered
.
He knew the sound well
,
after working with her for the better part of his 22 years
at
the pharmacy.
He
paused his counting
, but
didn’t look up
.
He took off his thick-framed glasses and set them on the counter
,
pinching
the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger
—
his
age-old
way of heading off a headache
.

“Oh my God
,
Martin,” said Kathie, tears welling in her eyes
.
“I am
so
s
orry
.
I
get to flappin’ my gums so much
some
times that I get ahead of myself. Oh God, Martin.”

“It’s okay, Kathie.
It’s okay.”

He couldn’
t blame her.
Maggie
had only been gone for two months
.
Death
created all sorts of conversational gaffs.
And he
was
grumpy anyway. Lack of good sleep was catching up with him.

“No, it’s not,” she insisted
.
“I would never purposely disrespect the memory of your daughter
.
You know I loved her
.
A
nd I love you and
June. . .
and you’ve just had that
divorce. . .
and now this on top of
it. . .
and I can’t imagine how you are feeling
now. . .
and I made it
worse. . .
and now
I
don’t know how to fix it
. . .
”  Her
words trailed off into tears.

He
stood
from his work
and hugged her
.
He
was
a foot taller than
she was
.
He
pulled her
in
and squeezed her shoulders.

“Kathie, it’s okay.”

She sobbed for a moment and drew away from him, sniffling
.
When she
went to the
back of the
pharmacy
to find a tissue
,
Martin returned to the counter, pulled his stool up and sat down to
recount the
pills
.
Tina’s conversation continued at a distracting volume behind the wall
.
He flipped on the small radio
he kept
on the c
ounter and turned it up
to drown
out her words
.

Chapter
6

Susan Nikko paused before knocking on her daughter’s bedroom door.

“Abby?” her mother asked, standing
outside
the doorway of her bedroom. “Can I come in?”

“Sure,” replied Abby, stretched out on her bed. She took
out her earbuds
and
set
her
music player
on the nightstand.

Smiling as she
walked in,
Susan sat
on
the foot of
the
queen-sized bed
and
stared at her
teen-aged
daughter
,
still in her silk pajamas
.
With he
r
long,
curly
,
blonde
hair,
deep
emerald eyes
and
full
lips, Abby
was beautiful, effortlessly so, and didn’t
really know it
.

Although
Abby would
always be her little girl,
Susan
was amazed at how much
the child
had grown up in the last few years
.
Her eyes trailed across Abby’s bedroom
.
Posters
of
country bands
canvassed
one wall
.
O
n the opposite side were
her pop idols and heroes of
hip-hop
.
Admittedly, she
preferred her daughter’s country music tastes, but she didn’t discourage
any of the girl’s
listening habits
.
Lately,
Susan
had decided
the
music
was
probably a
good medication for
Abby
.

Across the room, the
desk was a mess of
schoolbooks
,
paperbacks
and
psychology journals
.
Abby’s
laptop
seemed to teeter on the edge
.
Yesterday’s clothes and her backpack hung from the back of
the
chair
.
Her dresser was clean and closed
.
The nightstand
held
an alarm clock, her
music player
and a reading lamp
.
Her closet was closed
,
and her
hamper bulg
ed only
slightly
.

P
retty darn clean for a
teenager
.

O
pposite
the
bed
,
newspaper clippings
,
mostly from the Sports pages,
filled a bulletin board
.
Susan perused the familiar titles: 
Nikko Leads
S Tech
to
Fourth Victory of the Season,
Zack the Attack As Quarterback Does Just That
i
n Saturday’s Away Game, Freshman S
Tech
Quarterback Shows Promise, On and Off the Field
.

Then
Susan
spied
one of the more recent ones
,
and
her eyes
stung
:
S Tech
’s Zack Nikko Dies in Freak Sideline Accident
.
She turned back to Abby, who was watching her.

“Sweetie, it’s almost eleven o’clock,” she said
.
“It’s a beautiful Saturday
morning
.
Do you think you might
join us downstairs
?”

Her tone was light, loving and full of concern.

“Sure, Mom
.
I just didn’t sleep all that well last night.”

“
Thinking of Zack again?” her mother asked.

Abby nodded.

“You know
,
Abby, we could go
back
to the doctor
—
get you something to help you relax.”

“Thanks,
Mom
,
But it’s not that
.
My body feels relaxed, but when I’m in bed, at the end of the day, when I try to go to sleep, my mind goes crazy
.
I keep thinking of
him
.”

Susan gently
pushed
Abby’s long
golden
bangs out of her eyes.

“I miss him
,
Mom, I really do.”

“Oh sweetie,”
Susan
replied
.
She crawled up the bed and
lay
down, pulling the
rose-colored
comforter up around both of them.

“I know you do.
I do
,
too
.
We all do.”

They were silent for a moment
.
As her
mother
gently smoothed her
hair
,
Abby snuggled closer.

“I’ve been thinking that maybe I shouldn’t go to
S Tech
anymore,”
she
blurted.

“What?  Why?”

“Because
,
Mom,
t
hink about it
.
Those people had Zack on the brain
.
He was the
‘football hero.’
  Jeez
—
he
was
the football team.”

“Abby,
that doesn’t mean you should
n’t
go to school there
.
Football isn’t everything.”

“Oh please, Mom.
They gave him a name!  Do you know what that means?  You don’t get a football nickname for no reason, especially at a college like
S Tech
!  Zack “the Attack” Nikko isn’t something people are going to forget anytime soon!”

“I’m
not asking you to forget him!”
It came out stronger than she had intended.
 
S
he
sighed.

“I’m sorry
,
sweetie
,” Susan continued carefully. “
I am not expecting anyone to forget your brother
.
I don’t
want
anyone to forget him
.
But
S Tech
is a
huge
school, and they have a great
Psych
program for you
.
I thought that’s what you wanted to do.”

“It was
. . .
it is!
Argggh
. . .
I don’t know what I want
anymore
.” 

Abby
turned and bur
ied her face and screamed
into the pillow
.
She sobbed
.
Susan
rubbed her
daughter’s back with the same light touch she had used for years to tuck her into bed.
  After a few minutes,
Abby rolled over, wiping her eyes and sniffling.

“I do want to go there Mom.
It’s the
only
place I want to go
.
Ever since you
and Dad
took us there when we were little kids, it’s been
my
dream to go there
.
You know that.”

“Good.”

“But now that Zack’s gone, I’m scared it will seem, well
. . .
weird
.
What if people know who I am?  What if they ask me about Zack?”

“Then you tell them, Abby.
You don’t need to be embarrassed
—
just tell them how you feel
.
Describe Zack to them in the way only you can
.
Those people, if they
really do
have only
football on the brain, could use a dose of reality
.
You tell them how he really was
—
that there was more to him than just a stupid game.”

Abby s
a
t up
and rubbed
her eyes.

“But what if I don’t want to talk about it?” she countered.

“Then you don’t
,
Abby
.
If you don’t want to talk about Zack,
just
tell them that. I would think they would respect
that
.
You’ve certainly respected
me that way
lately, so I speak from experience.”

“Mom, don’t
—“

“No, Abby
.
I know I probably haven’t been able to give you the support you need
this last little while
.
I don’t need to tell you how hard all of this has been
—
on all of us. I am trying hard to be strong, but, well,
some days
are harder than others.
”

“I know that
,
Mom.
You don’t have to explain it.
Please.
We are all hurting
.
You’ve got to handle it the way you need to handle it
.
I understand it
,
I promise.”

Susan smiled.

“But it
’s not a stupid game,” said Abby
.
“It’s a great game, and Zack loved
it
,
and he was great at it
,
and people loved him
.
Not in the way I do or you do, but they still loved him
.
I don’t know if I can live up to that.”

“Abby, look
,
y
ou’re not Zack
.
N
o one should expect you to be
.
I know
how hard this is
for you
.
I know how close you two were
.
In fact
,
it made me jealous sometimes that you two relied on each other so much
,
”
Susan
said, smiling
.

“But he’s gone,” she continued
, voice trembling
. “
And
we’ve still got to move on
.
Don’t you think that’s what
he would have wanted?”

Abby nodded
.
“Yes, of course
,
he would.
He’d
have
call
ed
me a
‘
Chucklehead
’
if I didn’t!”

They both laughed.
Abby
lay
back down in bed and nestled her head under her mother’s chin
, breathing in the comforting smell of the
familiar jasmine
skin cream
.