To Sleep Gently (15 page)

"I'm sorry that I actually ditched you the other day."

"I wanted you to," he said. Then a little too honestly he told her, "I was hoping I'd never see you again."

"Am I really that bad of a person?"

"I dunno, maybe."

"Why, because I like you? Because I like you and you can't accept that, and so I scare you?" She moved in and slid her hand into his. He thought about pulling his hand away but didn't. She brought her lips close to his ear and whispered, "I scare you because you want me. You're scared of what might happen if you actually get what you want."

Goddammit, his head was spinning. With his free hand he grabbed his scotch and drank down the rest of it, then looked around for the waitress to order another. He hated admitting it, especially after the other day—but yes, he wanted her. Wanted her more than he could comprehend. He wished to hell and back that he didn't, but when he looked at her, he just couldn't stand it.

The waitress returned. "You made short work of that."

"I'll have another," he told her, and watched her leave.

Fuck it.

He squeezed her hand, moved in and kissed her.

She smiled, took another big gulp from her Tom Collins, looked him up and down and said, "You wanna see where I live?"

He gazed into her magnetic eyes.

4

That night, lying in bed next to her, he stared at the ceiling. So there it is, he said to himself, you stupid asshole. After a long personal berating, his eyes eventually drifted shut. Had he been more conscious he would have been surprised at where his mind took him. But instead he just relived it as though it were happening now. The Natural Reserve off Lake Avenue. Shelley, in the back of the truck, looking at the two of them with a glimmer in her eye.

"I'm not sure I can do this," Mike's eyes told him.

Like arriving at the first day of a new school, Jack stepped up to her. When he was close and ready, she reached out, wrapped her fingers around the base and tugged. Then all of a sudden he was in her. He became oblivious to everything else in the world. He didn't ever want it to stop. Never. And then, in what seemed like the blink of an eye, he was done. He held her tight, didn't want to let go. He kissed her on the lips and whispered ever so softly, "I love you."

His eyes snapped open.

He glanced over at Carly's silhouetted sleeping form. It had been good. It had been
very
good. It was something he had needed, and it was long overdue, and it had rocked his world; but something had been wrong. Beyond everything that was already clearly wrong with the situation, something very important had also been missing. What it was exactly, he wasn't sure, though he had some minor semblance of an idea.

On the dark black ceiling above him, he watched a slide show: he and Sandra in El Reno, laughing, hands joining, the gas station coming into view and then the road turning into the Santa Fe River, where he stopped, drew her close, and finally kissed her.

But she had never called. And so he slept fitfully. If he slept at all.

Chapter Eleven

When Dempster woke up, he refused to open his eyes. Though he hadn't seen it, he knew there was sunlight piercing the window, and knew that if his eyes drank it in his head was gonna start pounding. It already ached as it was.

He could hear her in the room with him, walking here and clanking, walking there and ruffling clothes. The sound of a bifold closet door opening was followed by a contemplative sigh.

His eyes eased open and light spilled into them, causing brief pain though not as much as he'd expected. Blinking enough for his vision to accept reality, he saw Carly standing at the closet with her back to him, wearing pink cotton panties and nothing else. He watched her peruse her wardrobe, select a khaki sundress with poppy flower print on it, consider it, replace it, and remove a soft turquoise cap sleeve pleated shirt. She glanced over her shoulder at him, saw he was awake, and smiled.

"Good morning," she said. Her voice was smooth and cool. She raised a seductive eyebrow, tossed the shirt onto the foot of the bed as she stepped around it and sat beside him. She leaned over him, kissed him once, and then hovered there, smiling.

He ached to draw her to him, to blindly take her again as he did last night. He studied the smile, studied her eyes, and found himself pulled into them. He allowed them to swallow him, her smile to taste him, to chew him up.

He sat up.

She didn't move, didn't speak, just looked at him.

He threw away the bedclothes, but before he could get up she was on top of him. He struggled, tried to push her away but she kept him down, pressing her soft skinned body against his. Her lips found his mouth. Her eyes went feral, and all of a sudden he found his heart pounding, heat blazing through him. He breathed hard, reached around her and held her tight, not ever wanting to let go as their bodies writhed, first off rhythm, then synchronized.

She reached a hand down to remove her panties.

Then suddenly he grabbed her wrist and wouldn't let her. When she tried to pull it away he twisted it. Not hard, but enough to let her know he was serious.

She stopped. Her eyes went puzzled, then blank.

With his other hand he slowly pushed her away and sat up.

"No more," he said. "No more of this."

"I don't understand," she said.

Climbing off the bed, he slid into his pants, gathered his socks and shoes then looked about the room. "Where's my shirt?"

"How the fuck would I know?"

He looked around again, saw it at the other end of the room. As he crossed over to it she got in his way and stopped him.

"What's your damage?"

Before he could say anything, there came the ring of his cell phone. It was on the floor, on the other side of Carly. The two of them exchanged a taut glance. Then Carly swooped down and snatched it up, raced to the other end of the room and answered it.

"Jack's cell phone," she said. "Well who the hell is this?" She raised an eyebrow, in no way seductive. "Oh, Sandra. Yeah, he told me about you," she lied, rendering a scornful look.

Dempster stepped forward.

Carly listened for a few seconds then said, "Well, we were just getting ready to fuck when you called. How about I have him call you later? .What's that?" She listened again, shrugged, "Oh well," and hung up. She looked at Dempster. "That was Sandra," she told him.

"You bitch."

She tapped the phone in her palm a couple times, then tossed it to him.

Dempster quickly pressed the buttons that brought him to his recent incoming calls. The number she'd called from was unavailable.

An unbearable quiet stepped into the room. The two of them stood there, staring at one another, rigid, mouths tight.

"Who's Sandra?"

"None of your business."

"She acted like she was your girlfriend. Or maybe hoping to be."

"Shut up."

"Maybe you
want
a girlfriend, and it's just not me that you want."

He pulled his shirt on, "I'm out of here," and started for the door.

She raced over and stepped in front of him, blocking his way again.

"Out of the way."

"You're not thinking clearly."

"I said out of the way."

She looked at him. As her blue eyes attempted to suck him in, to his surprise, they suddenly filled with tears. She turned away.

"Sorry," she said. Her tone was unbalanced, as though it might blip to dead silence, or erupt into hysterics. "I've been really depressed. Feeling like no one wants me." She looked at him, then looked away again. "I guess I can thank you for reaffirming that."

"You're insane," he told her.

"I'm sorry if I seem crazy. That sometimes happens when you really like someone. Sometimes you do things you never thought you would do. Give me a few years and a few more heartbreaks, then I guess it will be easy for me not to care either."

"Carly, you gotta stop. I'm gonna leave now."

She looked at him. Her eyes seemed to go blank. "Fine," she said.

"Don't be like this," he told her. "C'mon, let's grow up."

"Yeah, all right," she said. "Okay, let's grow up." She placed her hands on her hips. "I'm hurt," she said, then clacked her tongue. "But, hey, that's life, right? It's funny, you know? In some twisted way, I kind of feel like I'm just getting what I deserve. You know, for all the people in my life that I've hurt."

He tried to walk past her.

She blocked his way again. She wouldn't move. When she spoke, her voice was condescending. "And what are you gonna do once you're gone?"

"Breathe easier."

"You're gonna go find Sandra," she said. "Try and explain things to her."

"No," he said, "I can't."

"Yes you are. You're gonna call her and call her, and once you find her, you're gonna do anything you can to make things right. Tears will be in your eyes. You'll beg and grovel. You'll act like a lunatic. You'll lie through your teeth if only it will bring your Sandra back to you."

"Move," he said.

She leveled her gaze at him. "Is she better than me? Is she a better fuck than me?"

He dropped is shoes and socks, seized her by the arms and flung her onto the bed. "You keep your goddamn mouth shut," he told her, and picked up his socks and shoes.

Not another word was spoken as he walked out the door.

2

He parked on San Francisco Street, ironically in the same spot he'd found Sandra with her keys locked in her car. The air was hot and dry, the sun bright. He stepped into the shade of the portal, through a crowd of people, and then into the air-conditioned Starbucks and looked around. He knew it was pathetic. There wasn't a chance; but still he had tried.

"Something I can get for you, sir?"

"No thanks," he said. "Just looking for someone."

He left the cafe and wandered up the street to the Plaza. His feet carried him around the entire thing twice as his eyes took hopeful snapshots of everyone about. There were a lot of interesting looking people, some of them probably downright fascinating, but none of them were Sandra or even closely resembled her.

Last night came to mind again. Then everything else since he'd left Ohio hit him like a hammer. A whirling kaleidoscope of issues that he couldn't figure out. Everything had been happening so fast that he was dizzy, had been walking around in an aimless fog ever since he'd pulled to the side of the road in El Reno. He hadn't been able to make heads or tails of anything since his release, and as a result he was making some bad decisions.

Goddamn Carly. He could still see her when he closed his eyes, taking his one last shred of hope and squelching it in one simple act of spite.

His phone rang. He stopped, and retrieved it quickly.

It was Evan. "Missed you this morning."

"Yeah, whatever."

"Gardner says he's coming by after work tomorrow, around six."

"What the hell for?"

"Day after tomorrow," he said. "It's time."

"Already?"

"What'd you mean, already? It's what we've been waiting for. It's why we're here."

"All right, all right." Dempster hung up on him. He walked around the Plaza one more time, taking mental photos, and then slowly made his way back to his car. The sidewalk was caked with dirt, littered with cigarette butts and other small bits of trash. It was absolutely filthy, and he understood filth. He was a big part of the whole transcendental concept. One of the roots that kept it existing everywhere. The sidewalk had nothing on him.

He drove off, making a right on Don Gaspar Avenue and then a left on West Alameda, which was flanked on the right by the Santa Fe River. A small river, almost measly, practically serving no purpose whatsoever. He tried to accept the fact that things never could have worked anyway. He could never be what he wanted to be.

3

When he got to De Vargas Mall he knew he was being paranoid but figured it was better to be safe than sorry. Rather than heading straight for Essentials, he veered left and entered the mall between the movie theater and the pizza place. Down a short ways on the left, just past the drugstore, was a line of payphones. He looked up Essentials in the phonebook, then pumped change into the box and dialed.

After two rings a very loud voice said, "Thank you for calling Essentials at De Vargas Mall, this is Phil, how may I direct your call?"

"Hi, I was just wondering if Carly was working today."

"Hold on." A click followed by silence. If she got on the line he didn't know what he was going to do. Probably hang up. That's what he hoped he would do.

Another click and the background sound of Essentials returned, as well as the stentorian voice of Phil. "You still there?"

"Yes."

"Carly won't be in until four o'clock."

"Thank you."

He hung up, relieved, and cruised through the mall until he reached Essentials' inside entrance. A large black woman stood at the register and feigned a smile, though it was clear that she'd rather be anywhere other than where she was.

"Hello," she said.

"Howdy," Dempster told her without slowing, and made a right into the book department, where he found Mike with a cart packed full of science fiction books.

"Hey, Perky."

Mike looked up, "Hey, Jerky," and immediately grabbed a book from the cart and tossed it to him.
The Door of His Face/The Lamps of His Mouth/And Other Stories,
by Roger Zelazny. "They've just re-released it."

"Shit," Dempster said, flipping through the pages. "I haven't read this in years."

"I'll get you one on my discount."

"Cool." He studied it a moment, then placed the book back on the cart. "You up for some lunch?"

"I might be," Mike said, bobbing his head as he shelved a book. Then without looking at Dempster again he said, "You have a rough night?"

It hadn't occurred to him until just now that he was in the same clothes he'd worn the day before, hadn't bathed or had a shave or combed his hair or anything. The fact that he was somewhat hungover probably didn't help either. "I guess you could say that," he said. "Do I really look that bad?"