CHAPTER 14

‘Where am I? Who are you? Did you rape me? You did, didn’t you? ’

Her eyes are red and her hair is every whichway. Her picture could be next to hangover in the dictionary. She also looks scared to death, and Billy can’t blame her for that.

‘You were raped, but I didn’t rape you. ’

The knife is just the little one he used to pry up the splinters in his feet. He left it on the coffee table. He reaches out and takes it from her. He does it gently and she makes no protest.

‘Who are you? ’ Alice asks. ‘What’s your name? ’

‘Dalton Smith. ’

‘Where are my clothes? ’

‘Hanging from the shower rod in the bathroom. I undressed you and—’

‘Undressed me! ’ She looks down at the shirt.

‘And dried you off. You were soaking wet. Shivering. How’s your head? ’

‘Aches. I feel like I drank all night, but I only had one beer … and I think maybe a g-and-t … where are we? ’

Billy swings his feet to the floor. She backs away, hands coming up in a warding-off gesture. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee? ’

She considers it, but not for long. She lowers her hands. ‘Yes. And do you have aspirin? ’

He makes coffee. She swallows two aspirin while she waits for it, then slowly goes into the bathroom. He hears the door lock, but that doesn’t concern him. A five-year-old could bust that lock, and a ten-year-old would probably bust the door off the hinges in the bargain.

She comes back to the kitchen. ‘You didn’t flush. Ugh. ’

‘I didn’t want to wake you. ’

‘Where’s my phone? It was in my jacket. ’

‘I don’t know. Do you want some toast? ’

She makes a face. ‘No. I’ve got my wallet but not my phone. Did you take it? ’

‘No. ’

‘Are you lying? ’

‘No. ’

‘Like I should believe you, ’ she says with shaky contempt. She sits down, tugging at the hem of the T-shirt, although it’s long and everything that needs to be covered is covered.

‘Where’s my underwear? ’ The tone is accusing, prosecutorial.

‘Your bra is under the coffee table. One of the straps was broken. Maybe I can knot it together for you. As for underpants, you weren’t wearing any. ’

‘You’re lying. What do you think I am, a whore? ’

‘No. ’

What he thinks is that she’s a young girl away from home for the first time who went to a wrong place where there were wrong people. Bad people who loaded her up with something and took advantage of her.

‘Well I’m not, ’ she says, and begins to cry. ‘I’m a virgin. At least I was. This is a mess. The worst mess I’ve ever been in. ’

‘I can relate to that, ’ Billy says, and with absolute sincerity.

‘Why didn’t you call the police? Or take me to the hospital? ’

‘You were messed up but not circling the drain. By that I mean—’

‘I know what it means. ’

‘I thought I’d wait until you woke up, let you decide what you want to do. Maybe a cup of coffee will help you figure it out. It can’t hurt. And by the way, what’s your name? ’ Best to get that out, so he doesn’t screw up and say it himself.

He pours the coffee, ready to dodge if she tries throwing it in his face and then running for the door. He doesn’t think she will, she’s settling down a little, but this is still a situation that could go bad. Well hey, it’s bad already, but it could get worse.

She doesn’t throw the coffee at him. She sips some and makes a face. Her lips press tight together and he can see the muscles in her throat moving even after it’s gone down.

‘If you’re going to throw up again, do it in the sink. ’

‘I’m not going to … what do you mean again? How did I get here? Are you sure you didn’t rape me? ’

That isn’t funny but Billy can’t help smiling. ‘If I did, I think I’d know. ’

‘How did I get here? What happened? ’

He sips his own coffee. ‘That would be the middle of the story. Let’s start at the beginning. Tell me what happened to you. ’

‘I don’t remember. Last night is your basic black hole. All I know is I woke up here, hungover and feeling like somebody stuck a fencepost up my … you know. ’ She sips her coffee and this time she gets it down without having to repress a gag reflex.

‘What about before that? ’

She looks at him, blue eyes wide, mouth moving. Then her head droops. ‘Was it Tripp? Did he put something in my beer? My g-and-t? Both? Is that what you’re telling me? ’

Billy restrains an impulse to reach across the table and put his hand over hers. He’s gained a little ground but if he touches her he’ll almost certainly lose it. She’s not ready to be touched by a man, especially one with nothing on but worn workout shorts.

‘I don’t know. I wasn’t there. You were. So tell me what happened, Alice. Right up to when your memory drops out. ’

So she does. And as she does, he can see the question in her eyes: if you didn’t rape me, why did I wake up in your bed instead of a hospital bed?

It’s not a long story, even with some background added in. Billy thinks he could tell it himself once she gets started, because it’s an old story. Halfway through it she stops, her eyes widening. She begins to hyperventilate, her hand clutching her throat while the air goes whooping in and out.

‘Is it asthma? ’

He didn’t find an inhaler, but it might have been in her purse. If she was carrying one, it’s gone now.

She shakes her head. ‘Panic …’ Whoop ‘… attack. ’ Whoop.

Billy goes into the bathroom and wets a washcloth as soon as the tap runs warm. He wrings it out loosely and brings it back. ‘Tip your head up and put this over your face. ’

He would have thought it impossible for her eyes to get any wider but somehow they do. ‘I’ll …’ Whoop ‘… choke! ’

‘No. It’ll open you up. ’

He tips her head back himself – gently – and drapes the washcloth over her eyes, nose, and mouth. Then he waits. After fifteen seconds or so, her breathing starts to ease. She takes the washcloth off her face. ‘It worked! ’

‘Breathing the moisture makes it work, ’ Billy says.

There might be some truth in that, but probably not much. It’s breathing the idea that makes it work. He saw Clay Briggs – Pillroller, their corpsman – use it several times on newbies (and a few vets, like Bigfoot Lopez) before they went back for another bite of the rotten apple named Phantom Fury. Sometimes there was another trick he used if the wet washcloth didn’t work. Billy listened carefully when Pill explained both of these tricks to soothe the mental monkey. He’s always been a good listener, storing up information like a squirrel storing up nuts.

‘Can you finish now? ’

‘Can I have some toast? ’ She asks almost shyly. ‘And is there any juice? ’

‘No juice, but I’ve got some ginger ale. Want that? ’

‘Yes, please. ’

He makes toast. He pours ginger ale into a glass and adds an ice cube. He sits down across from her. Alice Maxwell tells her timeworn story. It’s one Billy has heard before and read before, most recently in the works of É mile Zola.

She spent a year after high school waitressing in her hometown, saving up money for business school. She could have gone in Kingston, there were two there that were supposed to be good, but she wanted to see a little more of the world. And get away from Mom, Billy thinks. He might be starting to understand why she’s not demanding he call the police immediately. But the question of why ‘seeing a little more of the world’ meant coming to this nondescript city … about that he has no idea.

She works part time as a barista at a coffee shop on Emery Plaza, not three blocks from Billy’s writing nest in Gerard Tower, and that was where she met Tripp Donovan. He struck up casual conversations with her over a week or two. He made her laugh. He was charming. So of course when he invited her out for a bite after work one day, she said yes. A movie date followed, and then – fast worker, that Tripp – he asked if she’d like to go dancing at a side-of-the-road place he knew out on Route 13. She told him she wasn’t much of a dancer. He of course said neither was he, they didn’t have to dance, they could just buy a pitcher of beer and stretch it out while they listened to the music. He told her it was a Foghat cover band, did she like Foghat? Alice said she did. She had never heard of Foghat, but she downloaded some of their music that very night. It was good. A little bluesy, but mostly straight-ahead rock and roll.

The Tripp Donovans of the world have a nose for a certain kind of girl, Billy thinks. They are shy girls who make friends slowly because they aren’t very good at making the first move. They are mildly pretty girls who have been bludgeoned by beauty on TV, in the movies, on the Internet, and in the celebrity magazines so that they see themselves not as mildly pretty but as plain, or even sort of ugly. They see their bad features – the too-wide mouth, the too-close-set eyes – and ignore the good ones. These are girls who have been told by the fashion mags in the beauty shops, and often by their own mothers, that they need to lose twenty pounds. They despair over the size of their boobs, butts, and feet. To be asked out is a wonder, but then there is the agony of what to wear. This certain kind of girl can call girlfriends to discuss that, but only if she has them. Alice, new in the city, does not. But on their movie date, Tripp doesn’t seem to mind her clothes or her too-wide mouth. Tripp is funny. Tripp is charming. Tripp is complimentary. And he’s a perfect gentleman. He kisses her after the movie date, but it’s a wanted kiss, a desired kiss, and he doesn’t spoil it by sticking his tongue in her mouth or grabbing at her breasts.

Tripp is a student at one of the local colleges. Billy asks how old he is, thinking she probably won’t know, but thanks to the wonders of Facebook, she does. Tripp Donovan is twenty-four.

‘Little old to still be going to college. ’

‘I think he’s a grad student. He’s doing advanced studies. ’

Advanced studies, Billy thinks. Right.

Of course Tripp suggested Alice come by his crib for a drink before heading out to the Bucket, and of course she agreed. The aforementioned crib was in one of those Sherwood Heights condos near the Interstate. Alice took the bus because she doesn’t have a car. Tripp was waiting for her outside, the perfect gentleman. He kissed her on the cheek and took her up to the third floor in the elevator. It was a big apartment. He could only afford it, Tripp said, because he and his roommates split the rent. The roommates were Hank and Jack. Alice doesn’t know their last names. She tells Billy that they seemed perfectly nice, came out to the living room to meet her, then went back into one of the bedrooms where some sports show was playing on TV. Or maybe it was a video game, she’s not sure which.

‘So that’s where your memory starts to get foggy? ’

‘No, they just shut the door when they went back in. ’ Alice is using the washcloth to dab at her cheeks and forehead.

Tripp asked if she wanted a beer. Alice tells Billy she doesn’t care for beer but took one to be polite. Then, when Tripp saw she was going slow on the Heinie, he asked if she wanted a gin and tonic. The door to Jack’s room opened and the sound from the TV went off and Jack said, ‘Did I hear someone mention gin and tonic? ’

So they all have g-and-t’s, and that’s when Alice says things started to get fogged-in. She thought it was because she’s not used to alcohol. Tripp suggested she have another. Because, he said, the second drink will fight the first. He said it’s a known fact. One of the roommates put on some music and she thinks she remembers dancing in the living room with Tripp, and that’s where her memory pretty much runs out.

She picks up the washcloth and breathes through it again for a little while. Her bra is still underneath the coffee table, looking like a small animal that died.

‘Now it’s your turn, ’ she says.

Billy tells her what he saw and did, beginning with the screech of brakes and tires and ending with putting her to bed. She thinks it over, then says, ‘Tripp doesn’t own a van. He has a Mustang. He picked me up in it when we went to the movies. ’

Billy thinks of Ken Hoff, who also had a Mustang. And died in it. ‘Nice car, ’ he says. ‘Was your roommate jealous? ’

‘I’m on my own. It’s just a small place. ’ As soon as the words are out, Billy can see she thinks she’s made a mistake telling him she’s on her own. He could point out that Tripp Donovan probably also knew this but doesn’t. She puts the washcloth over her face again and breathes, but this time her breath keeps whooping.

‘Give me that, ’ Billy says. This time he wets it under the kitchen tap, keeping an eye on her while he does it, but he doesn’t think she’ll break for the door wearing nothing but a thin T-shirt. He comes back. ‘Try again. Slow deep breaths. ’

When her respiration eases, he says ‘Come with me. I want to show you something. ’

He takes her out of the apartment, up the stairs, into the foyer. He points to the vomit drying on the wall. ‘That’s from when I brought you in. ’

‘Whose underwear is that? Is it yours? ’

‘Yes. I was getting ready to go to bed. It was falling down while I was trying to keep you from choking. It was actually kind of comical. ’

She doesn’t smile, only repeats that Tripp doesn’t drive a van.

‘I imagine it belongs to one of his roommates. ’

Tears begin to spill down her cheeks. ‘Oh my God. Oh my God. My mother can never find this out. She never wanted me to come. ’

Billy thinks he already knew that. ‘Let’s go back downstairs. I’ll make you some real breakfast. Eggs and bacon. ’

‘No bacon, ’ she says, grimacing, but she doesn’t say no to the eggs.

He scrambles two eggs and sets them before her with two more slices of toast. While she eats, he goes into the bedroom and closes the door. If she bolts, she bolts. He has been gripped by the fatalism he felt during Operation Phantom Fury, clearing the city of insurgents street by street and block by block. Checking for the baby shoe on his belt loop before stacking to go in each house. Each day he wasn’t wounded or killed increased the odds that the next day he would be. You could only roll so many sevens or make so many points before you crapped out. That fatalism became sort of a friend. What the fuck, they used to say. What the fuck, let’s get some. Same thing now: what the fuck.

He dons the blond wig, the mustache, the glasses. He sits on the bed and checks a couple of things on his phone. Once he’s got the info he needs, he goes into the bathroom and spreads a handful of baby powder on his stomach. He’s found it helps with the chafing. Then he takes the fake belly into the kitchen.

She looks at him with wide eyes, the last forkful of eggs suspended above the plate. Billy holds the Styrofoam appliance against his stomach and turns around. ‘Would you tighten the strap for me? I always have a hard job doing it for myself. ’

He waits. A lot depends on what happens next. She might refuse. She might even stick him with the knife he gave her to butter her toast. It’s not exactly a lethal weapon, she could have done more damage with the paring knife if she’d decided to use it on him while he was sleeping, but she could put a hurt on him even with a butter knife if she put her arm into it and got it in the right place.

She doesn’t stick him. She pulls the strap tight instead. Tighter than he’s ever managed even when he starts by turning the fake belly around to the small of his back so he can see the plastic buckle.

‘When did you know I knew? ’ she asks in a small voice.

‘While you were telling me your story. You were looking right at me and I saw it click. Then you had the panic attack. ’

‘You’re the man who killed—’

‘Yes. ’

‘And this is … what, your hideout? ’

‘Yes. ’

‘The wig and mustache is your disguise? ’

‘Yes. And the fake potbelly. ’

She opens her mouth, then closes it. She seems to have run out of questions to ask, but she’s not whooping for breath and Billy thinks that’s another step in the right direction. Then he thinks, Who am I kidding? There is no right direction.

‘Have you looked at your—’ He points at her lap.

‘Yes. ’ Small voice. ‘Just before I got up to see where I was. There’s blood. And it hurts. I knew that you … or somebody …’

‘It isn’t just blood. You’ll see when you clean yourself up. At least one of them didn’t use protection. Probably none of them did. ’

She puts the forkful of eggs down uneaten.

‘I’m going out. There’s a twenty-four-hour drugstore about half a mile from here, back toward the city. I’ll have to walk because I don’t have a car. You can buy the morning-after pill over the counter in this state, I just checked on my phone to make sure. Unless you have religious or moral objections to taking it, that is? ’

‘God, no. ’ In that same small voice. She’s crying again. ‘If I got pregnant …’ She just shakes her head.

‘Some drugstores also sell ladies’ underwear. If they do, I’ll buy some. ’

‘I can pay you back. I have money. ’ This is absurd and she seems to know it because she looks away, flushing.

‘Your clothes are hanging in the bathroom. Once I’m gone you could put them on and get out of here. I can’t stop you. But listen, Alice. ’

He reaches out and turns her face back to him. Her shoulders stiffen, but she looks at him.

‘I saved your life last night. It was cold and it was raining and you were unconscious. Drugged to the gills. If you didn’t die of exposure you would have choked on your own vomit. Now I’m going to put my life in your hands. Do you understand me? ’

‘It was those men who raped me? You swear? ’

‘I couldn’t swear to it in court because I didn’t see their faces, but three men dumped you out of that van and you were with three men in that apartment when your memory went dark. ’

Alice puts her hands over her face. ‘I’m so ashamed. ’

Billy is honestly perplexed. ‘Why? You trusted and you were tricked. End of story. ’

‘I saw your picture on the news. You shot that man. ’

‘I did. Joel Allen was a bad man, a hired killer. ’ Like me, Billy thinks, but there’s at least one difference. ‘He waited outside a poker game and shot two men because he lost big and wanted his money back. One of them died. I want to go now while it’s still early and there aren’t too many people on the streets. ’

‘Do you have a sweatshirt? ’

‘Yes. Why? ’

‘Wear it over that. ’ She points to the fake belly. ‘It will look like you’re trying to hide your stomach. It’s what fat people do. ’

The rain has let up but it’s still cold and he’s glad for the sweatshirt. He waits for a car to pass, splashing up water, then crosses the street to the vacant lot side. He sees the skid marks from the van. They’re not as long and dark as they would have been if the pavement had been dry. He drops to one knee, knowing what he’s looking for but not really expecting to find it. He does, though. He puts it in his pocket and re-crosses Pearson Street because the sidewalk on the vacant lot side was damaged by the machines the city brought in to demolish the train station. That was a year ago or more, judging by the way the vegetation has grown up, but nobody has bothered to fix the concrete.

He touches her lost earring as he walks. When the police take him, it will go in an evidence envelope, as will the rest of his possessions, and she’ll probably never get it back. Billy’s pretty sure she’ll drop a dime on him. Whether she believes he saved her life or not, she knows he’s a wanted killer, and she may also believe that she could be charged with aiding and abetting for not turning him in as soon as she gets a chance.

But no, Billy thinks. She’s a shy girl, a scared girl, and a confused girl, but she’s not a dumb girl. She could claim he kidnapped her and they’d believe her. Her phone won’t work even if she searches and finds it, but the Zoney’s convenience store is close and she can call the police from there. She’s probably there already and they’ll take him as he walks back from the drugstore. Cop cars with their misery lights flashing, one of them bouncing up over the curb in front of him, doors flying open even before the cruiser stops, cops getting out with guns drawn: Show your hands, get on the ground, face down, face down.

Then why did he do it?

Something about the dream he had last night, maybe – the smell of burned cookies. Something about Shan Ackerman, maybe, and the picture she drew for him of the flamingo. Maybe it even has something to do with Phil Stanhope, who will have told the police she went out with him because he seemed like such a nice man. A writer, maybe even one with a future, a star to which a working girl could hitch her wagon. Would she tell them she slept with him? If she leaves that part out, Diane Fazio won’t. Diane saw them leaving the house, even gave Billy a thumbs-up.

Maybe it has to do with all those things, but probably it just comes back to the simple fact that he couldn’t kill her. No way could he. That would make him as bad as Joel Allen, or the Las Vegas rape-o, or Karl Trilby, who made movies of men fucking kids. So he put on his fake wig and fake belly and plain glass spectacles and here he is, walking to a drugstore in the rain. Alice Maxwell not only knows he’s William Summers, she knows about Dalton Smith, the clean identity he had spent years building up.

Those assholes could have dumped her on another street, Billy thinks, but they didn’t. They could have dropped her further down Pearson Street, but they didn’t do that, either. He could blame fate, except he doesn’t believe in fate. He could tell himself everything happens for a reason, but that’s goofy bullshit for people who can’t face plain unpainted truth. Coincidence is what it was, and everything followed from that. From the moment they dumped the girl he might as well have become a cow in a chute, with nothing to do but trot with the others onto the killing floor. But it is what it is, as they also used to say in the sand, so what the fuck.

And there is one tiny glimmer of hope: she told him to put on the sweatshirt. It probably means nothing, just something she said to make him feel like she was a little bit on his side, but maybe it does.

Maybe it does.

The drugstore’s a CVS. Billy finds the morning-after pill in the family planning aisle. It costs fifty dollars, which he supposes is cheap compared to the alternatives. It’s on the bottom row (as if to be as hard to find as possible for bad girls who need it) and when he straightens up he gets a glimpse of wiry red hair two rows over. Billy’s heart jumps. He bends down again and straightens up again slowly, peering over the boxes of Vagisil and Monistat. It’s not Dana Edison, who he’s decided is the hardest of Nick’s hardballs. It’s not even a man. It’s a woman with her wiry red hair yanked into a ponytail.

Easy, he tells himself. You’re jumping at nothing. Dana and the others are long gone back to Vegas.

Well, maybe.

The women’s underwear is on the back wall. Most of it is for ladies who are leaky, but there’s a few other kinds as well. He thinks about the bikinis but decides that would be a little suggestive. It’s funny, in a way; he’s still operating on the assumption that she’ll be there when he gets back. But what other assumption is there? He will go back, because he has no other place to go.

He grabs a three-pack of Hanes cotton boy-leg shorts and takes them to the counter, looking for police cars outside, but doesn’t spot any. Of course they wouldn’t park in front, anyway. He’d clock them and maybe hole up with hostages. The clerk is a woman in her fifties. She rings up his purchases with no comment, but Billy is good at reading faces and knows she’s thinking that someone had a busy night. He pays with a Dalton Smith credit card and walks back out into the rain, now just a fine drizzle, waiting to be taken. There’s no one there but three women, chatting amiably together. They don’t look at him as they go into the drugstore.

Billy walks back to 658 Pearson. It seems like a very long walk because it’s more than a glimmer of hope now, and hope may be the thing with feathers, but it’s also the thing that hurts you. They could be waiting around back or in the apartment, he thinks. But no blue boys come rushing around the old three-decker, and there’s no one in the apartment but the girl. She’s watching Today on his television.

Alice looks at him and something passes between them. He shifts the pharmacy bag and digs in his righthand pocket. He holds his hand out to her and sees her flinch a little, as if she thinks he means to strike her. The bruises on her face are at their most colorful. They shout assault and battery.

‘I found your earring. ’

He opens his hand and shows her.

Alice goes into the bathroom to put on a pair of the new underpants but stays in the shin-length T-shirt because her skirt is still damp. ‘Denim takes forever to dry, ’ she says.

She takes the pill with water from the kitchen tap. He tells her the side effects may include vomiting, dizziness—

‘I can read. Who else lives in this building? It’s as quiet as the … it’s quiet. ’

He tells her about the Jensens and how they went on a cruise, neither of them knowing that in another six months the cruise lines will be shut down, along with just about everything else. He takes her upstairs – she comes willingly enough – and introduces her to Daphne and Walter.

‘You’re watering them too much. You want to drown them? ’

‘No. ’

‘Give them a couple of days off. ’ She pauses. ‘Will you be here for a couple of days? ’

‘Yes. It’s safer to wait. ’

She looks around the Jensens’ kitchen and living room, sizing it up the way that women do. Then she astounds him by asking if she can stay with him. Maybe stay in the basement apartment even after he’s gone.

‘I don’t want to go out until the bruises get better, ’ she says. ‘I look like I was in a car accident. Also, what if Tripp comes looking for me? He knows where I go to school, and he knows where I live. ’

Billy thinks that Tripp and his friends will want nothing more to do with her now that they’ve had their fun. Oh, they might cruise Pearson Street to make sure the place where they threw her out isn’t a crime scene, and when they sober up – or come down from whatever high they were riding – they will surely check the local news to make sure she’s not a part of it, but he doesn’t point these things out. Having her stay solves a lot of problems.

Back downstairs she says she’s tired and asks if she can take a nap in his bed. Billy tells her that would be fine unless she’s feeling dizzy or nauseated. If she is, it would be better for her to stay awake for awhile.

She says she’s okay and goes into the bedroom. She’s doing a good job of pretending she’s not afraid of him, but Billy is pretty sure she still is. She’d be crazy if she wasn’t. But she’s also still in shock, still humiliated by what has happened to her. And ashamed. He told her she didn’t have to be, but that bounced right off. Later on she’ll undoubtedly decide that asking to stay with him was a bad call, really bad. But right now all she wants is sleep. It’s in her slumped shoulders and shuffling bare feet.

Billy hears the creak of bedsprings. He looks in five minutes later and she’s either zonked out or doing a world-class acting job.

He boots up his laptop and goes to where he left off. You can’t write today, he thinks, not with everything that’s going on. Not with that girl in the other room, the one who may wake up and decide she wants to get the hell away from here, and me.

Only he’s also thinking about Pill’s wet washcloth treatment for panic attacks, and how it worked on Alice. Sort of a miracle, really. But that wasn’t Clay Briggs’s only miracle cure, was it? Smiling, Billy begins to write. The prose seems flat at first, ragged, but then he starts to get the rhythm. Soon he’s not thinking of Alice at all.

Clay Briggs – Pill – was a Corpsman 1st Class. He worked on everyone who needed working on, but he was Hot Nine from top to toe. He was small and wiry. Thinning hair, beaky nose, little rimless glasses that he was always polishing. He had a peace sign on the front of his helmet and for a week or so, before the CO made him take it off, a sticker on the back that said NEVER MIND THE MILK, GOT PUSSY?

Panic attacks were common as Phantom Fury went on (and on, and on). Marines were supposed to be immune from things like that, but of course weren’t. Guys would start rasping for breath, doubling over, sometimes falling down. Most were good little jarheads who wouldn’t admit to being scared so they said it was the smoke and dust, because those things were constant. Pill would agree with them – just the dust, just the smoke – and wet a washcloth to put over their faces. ‘Breathe through that, ’ he’d say. ‘It’ll clear the crap out and you’ll be able to breathe fine. ’

He had cures for other things, too. Some were bullshit and some were not, but they all worked at least some of the time: thumping wens and swellings with the side of a book to make them disappear (he called it the Bible cure), pinching your nose shut and singing Ahhhh for hiccups and coughing fits, breathing Vicks VapoRub steam to stop up bloody noses, a silver dollar rubbed on eyelids to cure keratitis.

‘Most of this shit is pure hill-country folk medicine I learned from my grammaw, ’ he told me once. ‘I use what works, but mostly it works because I tell ’em it works. ’ Then he asked me how my tooth was, because I had one in back that had been giving me trouble.

I said it hurt like blue fuck.

‘Well, I can take care of that, my brother, ’ he said. ‘I’ve got a rattlesnake rattle in my pack. Bought it on eBay. You go on and stick it between your cheek and gums back there, suck on it awhile, and your tooth is going to quiet right down. ’

I told him I would pass and he said that was good, because the rattle was way at the bottom of his pack, and he’d have to dump all his shit out to get it. If it was even still there, that was. All these years later I wonder if it would have worked. I eventually had that tooth pulled.

Pill’s most amazing cure – that I saw, anyway – was in August of ’04. It was the slack time between Operation Vigilant Resolve in April and Phantom Fury, the big one, in November. During those months, the American politicians had their own panic attack. Instead of letting us go in full-bore, they decided to give the Iraqi police and military one more chance to clean out the muj themselves and restore order. The big Iraqi politicians said it would work, but they were all in Baghdad. In Fallujah, a lot of the police and military were muj.

During that period, we mostly stayed out of the city. For six weeks in June and July we weren’t even there, we were in Ramadi, which was relatively quiet. Our job, when we did go into Fallujah, was to win ‘hearts and minds. ’ This meant our translators – our terps – made nice on our behalf with the mullahs and community leaders instead of bawling ‘Come out, you pig-fuckers’ through loudspeakers as we drove rapidly through the streets, always expecting to get shot at or blown up or RPGd. We gave out candy and toys and Superman comic books to the kids, along with fliers for them to take home, talking about all the services the government could provide and the insurgency couldn’t. The kids ate the candy, traded the comics, and threw away the fliers.

During Phantom Fury we stayed in what came to be known as Lalafallujah (after Lollapalooza) for days at a time, sleeping when we could on rooftops with overwatch on the four main corners of the compass, keeping an eye out for muj creeping up on other rooftops, ready to do damage and inflict hurt. It was like the death of a thousand cuts. We took in hundreds of RPGs and other weaponry, but the hajis never seemed to run out.

During that summer, though, our patrols were almost like a 9-to-5 job. On days when we went in to win ‘hearts and minds, ’ we’d leave when the sun was up and head back to base before it got dark. Even with the fighting in a lull, you didn’t want to be in Lalafallujah after dark.

One day when we were coming back we saw Mitsubishi Eagle station wagon overturned on the side of the road, still smoking. The front end was blown off, the driver’s door was open, and there was blood on what was left of the windshield.

‘Fuck me, that’s the lieutenant colonel’s ride, ’ Big Klew said.

There was a CSH tent set up at the base – the Combat Surgical Hospital. Without sides, it was actually more of a pavilion with a couple of big fans set up at either end. It was over a hundred degrees that day. About like usual, in other words. We could hear Jamieson screaming.

Pill went running, slipping off his pack as he went. The rest of us followed. There were two other patients in the tent, clearly fucked up with their own shit but not as divinely fucked up as Jamieson, because they were on their feet. One had his arm in a sling, the other had a bandage wound around his head.

Jamieson was lying on a cot with stuff, I think they call it Ringer’s lactate, running into his arm. The place where his left foot used to be had a pressure bandage on it, but the foot was gone and the bandage was already bleeding through. His left cheek was torn open and that eye was bleeding and all crooked in its socket. A couple of grunts were holding him down while a medic tried to get him to swallow some morphine tabs, but the lieutenant colonel was having none of it. He kept twisting his head from side to side, his good eye bulging and terrified. It landed on Pill.

‘Hurts! ’ he yelled. There was nothing of the old bossy (but sometimes funny) l-c in him. The pain had swallowed all that. ‘Hurts! Oh my fucking God it fucking hurts! ’

‘Dustoff’s on the way, ’ one of the medics said. ‘Take it easy. Swallow these. You’ll feel bet—’

Jamieson raised one bloody hand and swatted the pills away. Johnny Capps chased after them and picked them up.

‘Hurts! Hurrts! HURRRRTS! ’

Pill dropped to his knees beside the cot. ‘Listen to me, sir. I got a cure for the pain, better than the morph. ’

Jamieson’s remaining eye rolled toward Pill, but I didn’t think it was seeing anything. ‘Briggs? Is that you? ’

‘Yessir, Corpsman Briggs. You gotta sing. ’

‘This hurts so bad! ’

‘You gotta sing. It bypasses the pain. ’

‘It’s true, sir, ’ Taco said, but he gave me a look that said What the fuck?

‘Here we go, ’ Pill said. He started to sing. He had a good voice. ‘If you go down to the woods today … now you. ’

‘Hurts! ’

Pill took him by the right shoulder. Jamieson’s shirt was shredded on the other side and blood was oozing through. ‘Sing it and you’ll feel better. Guaranteed. I’ll give it to you one more time. If you go down to the woods today …’

‘If you go down to the woods today, ’ the l-c croaked. Then: ‘“The Teddy Bears’ Picnic”? You have to be fucking shitting m—’

‘No, sing it. ’ Pillroller looked around. ‘Somebody help me. Who knows the fucking song? ’

It so happened I knew it, because my mother used to sing it to my sister when she was just a baby. Over and over until Cathy went to sleep.

I couldn’t sing for shit, but I sang. ‘If you go down to the woods today you’re sure of a big surprise. If you go down to the woods today—’

‘Better go in disguise, ’ Jamieson finished. Still croaking.

‘Fucking right you better, ’ Pill said, and sang: ‘For every bear that ever there was will gather there for certain …’

The man with the bandage around his head joined in. He had a lovely strong baritone. ‘Because today’s the day the teddy bears have their piiiic-nic! ’

‘Give it to me, Lieutenant Colonel, ’ Pill said, still kneeling beside him. ‘Because today’s the day …’

‘The teddy bears have their piiic-nic. ’ Jamieson said most of it but sang the first syllable of picnic the way the man with the bandage on his head had sung it, drawing it out long, and Johnny Capps dropped the morphine tabs into his mouth, bombs away.

Pill turned his head to look at the rest of the Hot Nine. He was like a fucked-up bandleader encouraging audience participation. ‘If you go down to the woods today … come on, everybody! ’

So the members of the Hot Nine sang the first verse of ‘Teddy Bears’ Picnic’ to Lieutenant Colonel Jamieson, most of them just faking it until about the third time around. By then they had the words. The two wounded men joined in. The corpsmen joined in. On the fourth repetition, Jamieson sang it right through with sweat pouring down his face. People were running toward the tent to see what was going on.

‘Pain’s less, ’ Jamieson gasped.

‘Morphine’s kicking in, ’ Albie Stark said.

‘Not that, ’ Jamieson said. ‘Again. Please. Again. ’

‘One more time, ’ Pill said, ‘and put some feeling into it. It’s a picnic, not a fucking funeral. ’

So we sang: If you go down to the woods today you’re sure of a big surprise!

The jarheads who’d come to see what was going on also joined in. By the time Jamieson passed out, there must have been four dozen of us singing that foolish fucking song at the top of our lungs and we didn’t hear the Black Hawk coming in to take Lieutenant Colonel Jamieson uprange until it was swopping up dirt and practically on top of us. I never forgot

‘What are you doing? ’

Billy looks around, startled out of this dream, and sees Alice Maxwell standing in the bedroom door. Her bruises are stark against her white skin. Her left eye is puffed half-shut, making him think of the l-c, lying in that hot tent where the fans did jack shit even running at top speed. Her hair is all bed head.

‘Nothing. Playing a video game. ’ He hits save, then turns off the laptop and shuts the lid.

‘That was a lot of typing for a video game. ’

‘Do you want something to eat? ’

She considers the idea. ‘Do you have any soup? I’m hungry, but I don’t want to eat anything too chewy. I think I bit the inside of my cheek. It must have been while I was blacked out, because I don’t remember doing it. ’

‘Tomato or chicken noodle? ’

‘Chicken noodle, please. ’

That’s a good call, because he has two cans of chicken noodle soup in the pantry nook and only one of tomato. He heats the soup and ladles out a bowl for each of them. She asks for seconds, and maybe a piece of buttered bread? She sops it in the chicken broth, and when she sees him looking at her over his own empty bowl, she offers a guilty smile. ‘I’m a pig when I’m hungry. My mother always said so. ’

‘She’s not here. ’

‘Thank God. She’d call me crazy. I probably am crazy. She told me I’d get in trouble if I went away and she was right. First I date a rapist, now I’m in an apartment with a …’

‘Go on, you can say it. ’

But she doesn’t. ‘She wanted me to stay in Kingston and go to hairdressing school, like my sister. Gerry makes good money, she said I could, too. ’

‘Why did you want to go to business school here? I don’t get that. ’

‘It was the cheapest that was still good. Are you done? ’

‘Yes. ’

She takes their bowls and spoons to the sink, self-consciously pulling the T-shirt away from her bottom as soon as her hands are free. He can tell by the way she walks that she’s still in a fair amount of pain. He thinks he should get her to sing the first verse of ‘Teddy Bears’ Picnic. ’ Or they could sing it together, a duet.

‘What are you smiling about? ’

‘Nothing. ’

‘It’s how I look, isn’t it? Like I was in a prize fight. ’

‘No, just something I remembered from when I was in the service. Your clothes might be dry now. ’

‘Probably. ’ But she sits down again as she is. ‘Did someone pay you to shoot that man? They did, didn’t they? ’

Billy thinks of the half a million – minus his walking-around money – that’s safe in an offshore bank. Then he thinks of the million and a half that hasn’t been paid. ‘It’s complicated. ’

Alice offers a thin smile: tight lips and no teeth. ‘What isn’t? ’

She flicks through the cable channels on his TV, working her way up. She stops for a bit on TCM, where Fred Astaire is dancing with Ginger Rogers, then moves on. She watches an infomercial for beauty products for a little while, then turns it off.

‘What are you doing? ’ she asks.

Waiting, Billy thinks. Nothing else to do. He can’t work on his story with her in the room. He’d feel self-conscious, and besides, she’d want to know what he was writing. He thinks that of all the strange events in his life – there have been quite a few – this time on Pearson Street may be the strangest.

‘What’s out back? ’

‘A little yard, then a drainage ditch with some scrappy trees growing around it, then some buildings that might be storage sheds. Maybe from when the trains still stopped over there. ’ He gestures to the periscope window, now curtained. The rain is coming down in buckets again and there’s nothing to see out there. ‘The sheds are abandoned now, I think. ’

She sighs. ‘This has got to be the deadest neighborhood in the whole city. ’

Billy thinks of telling her that dead, like unique, is a word that cannot, by its nature, be modified. He doesn’t because she’s right.

She stares at the blank TV. ‘I don’t suppose you have Netflix? ’

As a matter of fact he does, on one of his cheapie laptops, but then he realizes there’s something better. ‘The Jensens do. The people upstairs? And there’s popcorn, unless they ate it all. I bought it myself. ’

‘Let me see if my skirt is dry. ’

She goes in the bathroom and shuts the door. He hears the lock turn, which tells Billy that he is still very much on probation. When she comes out she’s wearing the denim skirt and the Black Keys tee. They go upstairs. While he figures out how to find Netflix on the Jensens’ television, which is four times as big as the one Billy has downstairs, Alice peers out their bedroom window at the backyard.

‘There’s a barbecue, ’ she says, coming back. ‘It’s uncovered and sitting in a puddle. The whole backyard is a puddle. ’

Billy gives her the controller. She spends a few minutes spinning through the choices, then asks Billy if he likes The Blacklist.

‘Never seen it. ’

‘Then we’ll start at the beginning. ’

The premise of the show is ridiculous, but Billy gets into it because the main character, Red Reddington, is amusing and resourceful. Always one step ahead, as Billy wishes he were. They watch three episodes while the rain pelts down outside. Billy makes popcorn in the Jensens’ microwave and they both pig out on it. Alice washes the bowl and puts it in the drainer.

‘I can’t watch any more or I’ll get a headache, ’ she says. ‘You can if you want to. I think I’ll go back downstairs. ’

Casual. No big deal. Like we’re roommates sharing a duplex, Billy thinks. We could be sitcom people. The Existential Couple. He tells her he’s also had enough for now, although he thinks he wouldn’t mind going back for more Red another time.

He locks the Jensens’ apartment and they go back to Billy’s. After the popcorn, neither of them wants dinner. They watch the news and eat pudding cups instead. ‘Total junk food a-thon, ’ Alice says. ‘My mother—’

‘Don’t start, ’ Billy tells her.

The assassination of Joel Allen is no longer the lead story. There’s been a gas explosion in Senatobia, across the border in Mississippi, three dead and two more badly injured. Also, the turnpike west of Red Bluff has been temporarily closed because of flooding.

‘How long are you going to stay here? ’ Alice asks.

Billy has been mulling this over himself. If the people looking for him – local cops, FBI, possibly Nick’s hardballs – think he’s gone to ground in the city, they may think he’ll stay hidden for five or six days, maybe a week. He needs to stay on Pearson Street long enough to make them believe that he slipped out right after the shot after all. If Alice doesn’t complicate things by running away, that is.

‘Four more days. Maybe five. Can you do that, Alice? ’ Is it the first time he’s used her name? He can’t remember.

‘I saw how much that pill cost, ’ she says. ‘If I stay, can we call it square? ’

She might be deking him, but he doesn’t think so. She has wounds to lick, and she’s decided he’s not dangerous. At least not to her. Although she did lock the bathroom door when she was putting on her clothes, so there’s still a trust issue. If he tries to persuade himself otherwise he’d be kidding himself.

‘Yes, ’ Billy says. ‘We can call it square. ’

They have their first fight at ten-thirty that night. It’s over who’s going to sleep in the bed and who’s going to sleep on the couch. Billy insists that she take the bed, says he’ll be fine on the couch.

‘That’s sexist. ’

‘Sleeping on the couch is sexist? Are you kidding me? ’

‘Being a manly man is sexist. You’re too long for it. Your feet will hang out on the floor. ’

‘I’ll put them here. ’ He pats the arm of the couch.

‘Then all the blood will run out of your legs and they’ll go to sleep. ’

‘You were …’ He hesitates, looking for the right word. ‘… attacked. You need to rest. You need sleep. ’

‘You want the couch because you think if I’m out here in the living room, I can run away. Which I’m not going to do. We’ve got a deal. ’

Yes, Billy thinks, and if she keeps to it, we need to talk about how she’s going to handle the questions once I’m gone. He wonders if Alice knows what Stockholm Syndrome is. If she doesn’t, he’ll have to explain it.

‘We’ll flip a coin. ’ He takes a quarter out of his pocket.

Alice holds out her hand. ‘I’ll flip it. I don’t trust you, you’re a criminal. ’

That makes him laugh. She doesn’t, but at least she smiles a little. Billy thinks it would be a good one if she really let it go.

He hands her the quarter. She tells him to call it in the air, then flips it like someone with experience. He calls tails (he always calls tails, learned it from Taco) and tails it is.

‘You take the bed, ’ Billy says, and she doesn’t argue. In fact, she looks relieved. She’s still walking very carefully.

She closes the bedroom door. The light beneath goes out. Billy takes off his shoes, pants, and shirt, and lies down on the couch. He reaches behind him and turns out the lamp.

Very quietly, from the other room, she calls, ‘Goodnight. ’

‘Goodnight, ’ he calls back. ‘Alice. ’

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