“Sure, I’ll go get it.” He leaped up.
“No, I will,” she said.
While she was in the kitchen, Todd studied the backs of his hands. Actually, they did look a little hairier than he’d noticed before.
She came back out with two glasses of wine, clothed again in his robe, pulled tight around her, the belt cinched tight. They both drank, Sky standing against the wall, some distance from Todd.
“What day is it, do you know?” she said.
“I don’t know. I don’t keep track these days.”
“It was Friday night when I came over.”
“Then it’s still Saturday.”
“Wow, I’ve only been here a day. Seems like we’ve gotten to know each other so well in such a short time.”
He laughed happily, but noticed the look on her face was rather sober and maybe a little anxious.
“You know, I’m going to have to be going pretty soon.”
He was shocked. “Going? What do you mean?”
“I have to leave because, see, I’m supposed to visit my grandmother. That’s why I was traveling this way. She asked me to visit. I haven’t seen her in a long time.”
“Let’s go together.”
She laughed briefly. “No, better not.”
“I don’t want you to leave.”
“Aww. That’s sweet, but I have to.”
“You’re going to leave me so soon? And after all… all this?”
“I’m going to visit my grandmother, and then I’ll come back, okay?”
They stared at each other for a long moment. “No, Sky,” Todd said finally. “No, it’s not okay.”
CHAPTER 29
JAIME WITH CLARE SOME MORE
Jaime was driving pretty steadily, considering Clare had been weeping and, occasionally and without warning, striking him upside the head. “You thought she was really dead, didn’t you? Just plain dead. Not that you’d be hard to fool.”
“She was dead,” said Jaime. “I didn’t hurt her. She was already dead.”
“You’re a pig,” said Clare. “You’re lower than a pig. Pigs are clean compared to you.”
Jaime knew this was unfair because he’d heard about how pigs would actually eat people, and not only when they were dead. He’d never heard about them rutting with people though, dead or otherwise, but he could see how they might. Dogs did, after all, at least with live people, like, humping on their leg and all that. He didn’t think he’d done anything wrong, since the girl couldn’t feel anything, but knew it wasn’t the kind of thing you should tell anybody, and he wasn’t going to admit it even though he’d kind of unintentionally already done so. Still, he was sweating with fear because Clare was getting so crazy about it. She was crazy in the first place anyway, if she thought that girl was alive, even alive like a zombie is, or whatever she thought. Why was she so mad anyway, if she thought they were evil?
“Don’t hit me no more. We’ll go and find her and you’ll see,” he insisted. “We’re almost there.”
Clare had her head turned, looking out the window. She didn’t speak for a while. But again, she turned abruptly and spoke furiously, as if her silences only allowed her furies to build. “So she was the perfect lover for you, wasn’t she? You’re with somebody, but you’re still alone. Just a thing to play with. She was still warm, too, wasn’t she?”
“It was cold out,” said Jaime, then realized even that was more than he should say.
They finally reached the graveyard, and drove a ways into it, until the dirt road narrowed into a walking path crowded with trees. They stopped and got out, Clare now silent again, for some minutes, so Jaime worried the next fury would be far worse. The path petered out completely shortly after taking a turn, and Jaime worried he had chosen the wrong spot, but soon he saw the little cemetery ahead. There was still some light out, but dusk was beginning. He was pretty sure he remembered which spot he’d buried her in, over a ways beside that one gravestone that was bigger than the others and square like a cabinet rather than a plank of stone. Indeed, the outhouse was a short distance away. He hustled off toward it at a run.
“Hey!” said Clare. “Where you going? Don’t run. You’re not going to get away from me.”
“I’m gonna get the shovel,” he said, stopping and looking back. What if he did run away? How would she stop him? It wasn’t like she had a gun pointed at him. Still, he had stopped running.
“What shovel?”
“It’s in there,” he said, pointing to the outhouse. “That’s what I used when I buried her.”
“Okay, go ahead.”
He went into the old outhouse. It was still rank in there, but the smell was old and stale. The shovel, short and very rusted, its wooden post almost black with decay, was lying on the floor. He lifted it, showed it to Clare. “See?”
She nodded. “Get her, then.” She said it like it was a challenge she didn’t expect him to meet. In fact, Jaime was now worrying maybe he hadn’t buried her deep enough and something had got her, like, maybe an animal dragged her away. Or maybe she’d just decayed away.
He looked around, couldn’t find a spot that looked the same. He’d left a bunch of leaves over it, he remembered, but those were gone. Well, he guessed they would be. Afraid Clare would get mad again if he acted too uncertain, he started to dig right in front of him, hoping it would turn out to be the right spot.
The ground sure was hard. He could barely get the shovel to penetrate it. Would it have gotten that hard over the months since he’d buried her? Maybe, he didn’t know.
Clare sat down on the ground and wrapped her arms around her knees, staring at him. She was motionless but didn’t exactly look patient. He decided to try another spot but didn’t say anything and, glancing back at her warily, it didn’t seem Clare’s expression had changed.
Jaime had dug in four different spots, and the sky had gotten a lot darker when she finally spoke. “You have no idea where she is, do you?”
“I think,” he said, panting, his arms aching badly, “she must have rotted away.”
“Decomposed,” said Clare. “I don’t think so.” She got up and walked toward him, slowly.
“She was here but, you know, corpses rot away and stuff.” He had a feeling one of Clare’s furies was coming, a big one this time.
Still, she only walked, slowly, never taking her eyes from him. “Either that or she got up and walked away.” This sounded to Jaime like she was being sarcastic, but he recalled what she’d said in the car, about the girl being alive.
“She was dead,” said Jaime.
“I know,” said Clare. “She was dead all along. That doesn’t mean she didn’t get up and leave after you buried her. Sounds like you didn’t bury her very deep.” In a quick gesture, she picked up the shovel, flew toward Jaime and battered him with it, first on his arm and shoulder and then aiming at his head. He covered his face with his hands and ran.
He heard a thud, looked back and saw, in the dim light, she’d thrown down the shovel. “C’mon,” she said, “get back in the car and let’s go. Let’s go find her. She’s with Todd.”
Jaime wished he could run but was afraid she’d catch up if he did. “Don’t you want to see the mural first?”
“I want to see her, if it isn’t too late,” said Clare. “C’mon, move it or lose it.”
CHAPTER 30
HEATHER AND FRED AT THE LIMBO WATCH TV
Heather mopped off the stuffed vinyl maroon barstools with a wet rag, a task Fred insisted she do before they open each day that she found pretty icky, just the thought of it really. People’s butts on them. A TV news report on the Westside Slasher had ended, but there was nothing new in it.