Chapter 6
Chapter Six
L orelai…
I felt my expression soften as the memory reached out of the dark to caress the inside of my skull with the sensation of fondness.
“I think my granddad used to call me that,” I said, and Hangman looked surprised.
He grunted and shifted a little awkwardly in his seat and gruffly said, “Sorry.”
I shook my head. “Don’t be,” I said. “It didn’t hurt my feelings. I think he’s gone now, but I kind of liked it. It brought back a good memory. You know? Anything that brings back a memory is a good thing right now, I guess.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” he cautioned and I smiled, a wan, brittle thing.
“The doctor was straight with me,” I said. “Gentle, like you’ve been, but straight with me.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked.
I swallowed hard and said with a shrug, “That I was probably…” I groped in my muddled brain for a word that fit the description without being too overtly ugly. “Attacked.”
He stared at me and nodded slowly and I felt my brittle smile return as I forced it back onto my lips.
“She said I might never really remember what happened. That if it’s that new drug or whatever. That girls rarely do. I don’t think I would mind not knowing that part, if it happened or whatever. I definitely will mind if none of the rest of it comes back. She said only time would tell on that.” I wrung my hands for lack of anything to really do with them and shrugged my shoulders.
“Doc said you should rest. You tired?”
“Hungry,” I said. “And yes, tired too.”
He got up and I jumped, which made him immediately still, a hand out in my direction like he was trying to soothe a frightened animal.
“Whoa, hey, I told you – you’re all good. Come have a seat and get comfortable. I’ll make us a couple of sandwiches or something.”
I nodded and edged into the living room. He gave me a wide berth and we sort of did this carefully spaced choreographed dance around one another. I took his place on the couch, far back, tucking myself into the corner against the arm, the room out in front of me, the windows at my back, the night pressing against the glass from the other side.
“Don’t suppose you know if you’re allergic to anything?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Honestly, not that I know of,” I said. I frowned slightly and said, “Actually, I think that is one thing I do know, and no, I’m not allergic to anything. I’m fairly confident about that.”
“Anything you don’t like?” he asked, searching my face and I stared back.
“The taste of green peppers and the texture of peas…” I said, and my smile when it came was a little more hopeful and a little less brittle.
“Good, that’s good,” he said.
He went to the fridge and brought some things out, carefully making a couple of sandwiches while I watched.
“Don’t really have much to drink,” he said. “Beer, ginger ale, milk.” He pulled the jug out of the fridge and smelled it, wincing and taking it to the sink and pouring it down the drain. “Scratch that – ginger ale, beer, and water seem to be your choices. Got some vodka in the freezer, I think.”
“Ginger ale is fine,” I said and he nodded, bringing out a green soda can and heading over with it in one hand and a plate with a sandwich and chips in the other.
“Nothing fancy,” he said, clearing his throat. “Afraid I’m not much of a cook.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “Me either, I think. Maybe it’s something I could try to learn.”
“What do you like? Do you know what you did for work or if you did work? How old you are?” he asked, watching me with fascination. I stopped, plate perched in one hand, icy can seeping cold into my other hand and already beginning to sweat.
I shook my head. “It’s the strangest thing. It’s like I go to think about certain things and it’s like running up against a wall of blank… Like the information is there, it’s just in the dark and just out of reach of my fingertips.”
“Sorry,” he said, quietly. “Don’t overdo it.”
“I’m trying not to panic,” I said and he gave me a crooked smile.
“You’re doing great on that front,” he said. “You seem like a levelheaded girl, Lorelai.”
“I don’t know how levelheaded I can be, letting myself get roofied or whatever,” I said, averting my gaze to the plate I lowered into my lap.
“No telling that you let yourself be anything,” he said. “You don’t know if somebody held you down and made you take it.”
“No,” I said. “That’s true.”
“You seem like you do a good job at staying cool in stressful circumstances to me,” he said.
“There’s really nothing I can do,” I said. “Panicking isn’t really going to achieve anything,”
“Good point,” he said.
“What if it turns out that I’m no use to you or your leader or whatever he is?” I asked. “What happens then?”
“I don’t have an answer for that,” he said gently. “Let’s not try to borrow any trouble before trouble hits the doorstep.”
I rubbed my lips together and nodded carefully.
“Seems reasonable,” I said.
“Eat your sandwich,” he reminded me gently.
I took a deep breath and nodded, setting the can down on the floor by the couch, unopened for now, and picking up the sandwich with both hands and taking a bite. I made a face like I was impressed because I was. It tasted good. Turkey, ranch, bacon, lettuce, onion, and tomato. Whole grain bread of some kind and lightly salted potato chips on the side. It was simple fare, but after that first bite, I realized just how famished I was.
He took his own plate and a beer and sat in a recliner that matched the couch across the room from me, giving me my space and eating with a sort of pleased half-smile on his lips as he watched me practically inhale my food.
“Glad you like it,” he said, as I worked on chewing through my final bite.
“It’s good. Thank you,” I said.
“Not a problem,” he replied, and it felt weird… like I knew I wasn’t free to go or whatever. Not that I really had any place to go, but at the same time, he was being so kind and patient with me. I mean, granted it was probably just to keep me complacent… but still. I was finding it hard not to like him for it.
I certainly liked him the best out of everyone I’d met since waking up on that cold, metal table with a strange man’s dick in my hand.
“You take the bed,” he said. “I’ll sleep out here.”
“That hardly seems fair,” I said.
“Probably not,” he agreed. “But what it is, is more secure.”
“Oh,” I murmured, and took another drink from the can of ginger ale I’d opened about three enormous bites into my sandwich.
“Yeah, both doors out of this place are in here and there’s no porch outside the bedroom or bathroom windows. Nor any way to climb down, so don’t try it. I promise, as long as you’re here, you’re safe. I won’t touch you. No one else will touch you.”
“I believe you,” I said quickly. “Thank you for the reassurance. To be honest…”
“I prefer it,” he said and it caught me off guard. I sat there, mouth hanging open for a moment before I closed it. Ater studying him a moment and having him study me back, I finished what I was going to say.
“To be honest, I don’t really know or have anywhere else to go at the moment.”
He nodded slowly. “That’s true enough, I guess.”
“What happens now?” I asked after the seconds stretched into minutes of silence between us.
“Go to bed, Sweetpea. Try to get some rest. Let’s see what you can remember after a good night’s sleep.”
I nodded and picked up the can of ginger ale from where I’d set it back on the floor. I went to pick up the empty plate beside it but he stopped me with a quiet, “Leave it. I’ll get it.”
“Thank you,” I said, and I think he picked up on the fact I meant it more than just about taking care of my plate. He raised his chin slightly and gave me one of those nods that meant
“no problem” and I slipped off back in the direction of the bathroom to use it one more time before moving across the narrow hall to the darkened room that held a bed.
Moonlight and a faint glow from the streetlight outside the cemetery gates filtered in through the uncovered window glass, and I wondered at some of the strange things in his room. There were dressers, sure. A chest of drawers. So, nothing abnormal there. What was strange was the tripod-looking thing in the corner with pillows and blankets underneath it, a big silver ring hanging between the three poles, twisting lazily, the moonlight winking off the curve of it.
I don’t remember ever seeing anything like it before. I wondered, vaguely, what it was.
The still and the quiet of the house settled around me, and I was comforted by the vague golden glow coming from the living room, and of Hangman’s presence out there.
I believed him when he said he wouldn’t touch me.
I also believed him when he said he wouldn’t let anyone else touch me, either.
I honestly don’t know why I believed him, other than, I guess, he just had an honest face.
I really liked it and his eyes.
Weird, I know.