Chapter 2 #2
I sat there for a long time, just sitting there.
There would be no discussion. My boys wanted to move away from me and have exciting adventures out in the big wide world without me.
If Wat was really lighting people on fire, if everyone agreed that the boarding school was the best thing, what could I do?
It’s what they wanted. No, I didn’t need to discuss things with Hazen.
We didn’t need to talk about anything ever again.
I walked slowly back to my car, ignoring the nice security guard who told me to have a nice day. I was not having a nice day. I needed to talk to someone who wouldn’t expect me to be reasonable and accept the sensible course of action.
I drove straight to the iffy side of town, not quite bad, because that was two blocks east, and parked in front of a tall house that had been nice seventy years ago.
I got out and went up to the gate, ringing the buzzer while feeling numb.
It took Gloria a few minutes to answer. She buzzed me back. “Just leave the package in the package drop. I don’t need to sign anything.”
“Gloria, it’s Lucy.”
“Lucy? Lucy who?”
I rolled my eyes. “Lucky Mayhem to you. Can I come in?”
“Did you bring alcohol?” she asked, but the gate swung open, letting me into the narrow courtyard filled with desiccated leaves and plastic bags caught in the spindly bushes.
She greeted me on the front stoop, staring at me with the greatest suspicion.
Her bright purple eyes clashed with her short red curls, but it did match the purple caftan she wore over her lean frame.
“I’m so tired,” I said, walking past her into the house. I threw myself on the nearest slouchy chair and put up my feet on the books and papers piled on the coffee table.
“Are you wearing a suit?”
“And uncomfortable underwear, because I didn’t have time to change. I just got dressed in the laundry room in the outfit I wore last night.”
“You’re saying that you’re here because you’ve gotten bored with the soccer mom lifestyle and decided that it’s time to try prostitution? I appreciate you thinking of me first when looking for a pimp, but the market for mothers past their prime is surprisingly slim these days.”
I gave her a good glare. “Why did I come here?”
“You want me to read your fortune?”
I glanced over at the room with beaded doorways where she kept her crystal ball for the na?ve tourist. “No. I just want to drink with you until I forget my own name.”
“Oh, good. It would be easier to do that if you brought alcohol, but I may have a few bottles in case of emergency in the basement. I’ll be back.”
She headed down the stairs in her green tartan socks, leaving me to feel like an idiot for so many reasons. I had no idea what I was doing there, but I had no idea what I’d be doing anywhere.
“From here to there, from there to here, funny things are everywhere.”
I zoned out until she came back up, carrying two large bottles of really good stuff, a scotch and a schnapps, along with a box that I hadn’t seen for over fifteen years. I’d given it to her when I got married.
“Why did you bring that up?”
“Do I look like a storage unit manager to you? Put your past to bed the right way, or the old memories will haunt me instead of you. You have too many ghosts.”
She dropped the box on my lap then fell into the chair next to me. She handed me one of the bottles. “Send me a nice case of alcohol for Christmas with all that nice money your husband gives you.”
“It’s not nice money. It’s treacherous money filled with ruinous truths and cruel kindnesses.”
“You’re getting poetic before you’ve had anything to drink? This is serious. Let me guess, he’s cheating on you! Or you killed him because he was so boring that you couldn’t take it anymore. I get that. You were completely justified. It was self-defense. It was him or you.”
I sighed heavily and opened my bottle. She had the scotch and had already taken a big swig.
I sipped a tiny bit of my schnapps and then capped the lid.
I didn’t really want to get drunk at lunchtime.
I should call up Hazen and tell him I couldn’t make it.
Like he’d called me up to tell me that he wouldn’t make it last night.
I took another longer pull from the bottle while anger flared through me.
I said, “Did I miss something? I feel like the play ended, but no one told me that it was only a play. I thought it was real life. What is real life if it wasn’t that?”
“I have no idea, but I’d rather be in a play than real life, if that’s an option. Plays are all the highlights, the drama, the excitement. Real life is just ho-hum. Your life has been so ho-hum, it must have been real.” She laughed like that was so funny, and maybe it was.
I took another drink then set the bottle on the floor and opened the box.
I didn’t have a ton of stuff from my life before, some tacky jewelry, like a barbell choker, and a bejewelled gold cross on a rusted chain, along with an odd assortment of cheap rings.
I also had a few journals I’d kept, and my favorite fairy tank top with fake fur rainbow straps. Yeah, I was classy in my youth.
I put on everything, stripping out of the silky blouse so I could pull the tank on over my fancy bustier. I stacked on the necklaces and rings, then put in the ear cuffs before I noticed how Gloria was watching me.
“What?”
“You really are wearing ridiculous underwear. It doesn’t go with the skirt or shoes. Did you keep the red pleather pants?”
I looked, and sure enough, at the bottom of the box were my favorite old pair of pants, smelling of my old favorite blend of essential oils. No way I’d be able to get them on, but I’d try.
After a great deal of effort, I had the pleather pants on. I spun around, holding my bottle. “They fit! All I need are my old boots.”
“They’re in the hall closet. I use them for gardening.”
I gave her a look. “You never garden.”
“True, but once I had a racoon stuck in a tree, and I used your boots to knock it down.”
“That’s exactly like gardening.” I went to the closet off the main foyer and pulled on the thick-soled black boots.
“You look ready to go somewhere. Wow, that look. Could kill someone. And you’re walking around in those pants like a pro.”
I sniffed and took another liberal drink. “Rebel pants. Born to be wiiiiiiiild!”
“Born to be Wiiiiiiild!” she sang after me.
For a moment we grinned at each other, and then she darted to her aunt’s ancient stereo system and a random song came on from her aunt’s playlist. Her aunt had fostered a lot of kids, benign neglect was probably a good definition for her parenting style, but she’d been better than most, and she’d come with Gloria who had felt more like my sister than anything by the time I aged out of the system.
We danced and drank until I decided that I needed to walk the few blocks to the old movie theater I used to work at and catch a matinee.
“Matinees are cheaper,” I told her seriously. “If I’m leaving my husband forever, I’ll have to pinch my pennies.”
She nodded very seriously. “Good thinking. Practice being poor so you can decide if the boredom is worth the price.” She threw her arms around me dramatically, knocking me back into a wall.
“You always have a home here. Although if you live here, I’ll make you do all my cooking and cleaning like a glorified Cinderella. Also gardening.”
I squeezed her back. “I’ve been dying to clean your house for years. And garden. We housewives are terrors when it comes to cleaning and cooking.”
She pulled back and stared at me seriously then burst out laughing. “You don’t look like a housewife. Have fun at the matinee, Lucky!”
I danced out of the house, feather boa thrown around my shoulders and a big bottle of schnapps under my tank top, with a bright red wig over my usual blond.
I sang the three blocks east, vaguely noticing that the neighborhood had gotten even more dismal and depressing in the last few years.
I kicked a pile of leaves and spun around, feather boa flapping.
The old movie theater looked like a set for a haunted house, but it still smelled like buttery popcorn when I pushed through the barred front door. The bells jangled, and Tom came in, as tall and bony as I remembered, with a suspicious pinch to his eyes.
“Tom! I’ve come to sneak alcohol into the movie!”
He leaned closer to get a look at me then pulled back like he’d smelled something strong. “You just missed the last matinee. The next show doesn’t start until six forty-five.”
I grabbed his arm, and he widened his stance to keep me from taking him down with me. “But I need to watch a matinee because it’s cheaper. Don’t turn me away, Tom, please?” I batted my lashes at him like I was still a fourteen-year-old trying to get a job.
He stared at me as emotionless as he was the first time we’d met. “I can set you up in theater number one. I’ve been using it as storage.”
“You stopped fighting the ghosts? How practical of you. Thanks! I knew I could count on you.”
He nodded and walked with me, flicking on his old flashlight as we went down the dark hall, past the other theaters with their moans and muffled shrieks. I kept quiet, because I knew the job. Paying customers got deference.
“What do you want to watch?” he asked when we finally got to theater number one. It was on the end, strangely enough.
“How about an old Jet Li film? I haven’t watched one of those for way too long.”
“All right.” He pushed the door open for me and shone his light around so I could see the clear walkway and the group of empty aisles that weren’t blocked up by old popcorn makers or pinball machines or broken dispensers. Large swathes of fabric were spread over the back rows of seats.
I stumbled down the aisle towards the middle row, following the thin beam of Tom’s light. It was so spooky, but fun.