The gun. They'd been talking about this for the last couple of weeks, ever since a house two blocks down the street was broken into when the family was at home asleep. In the past few months, Atlanta's crime wave had been washing closer and closer to their front door. Laura was against having a gun in the house, but burglaries were on the rise in Buckhead and sometimes when Doug was gone at night she felt frighteningly vulnerable even with the alarm system.
"I think I'd better go ahead and do it, with the baby on the way," he continued as he picked at the casserole. "It won't be a big gun. Not a Magnum or anything." He gave a quick, nervous smile, because guns made him jumpy. "Maybe a little automatic or something. We can keep it in a drawer next to the bed."
"I don't know. I really hate the idea of buying a gun."
"I thought maybe we could take a class in gun safety. That way you'd feel better, and I would, too. I guess the gun shops or the police department teach a class."
"Great," she said with a little cynicism. "We can schedule gun class right after our prenatal class."
"I know having a gun around the house bothers you, and I feel the same way. But we've got to face reality: this is a dangerous city. Like it or not, we ought to have a gun to protect David with." He nodded, the issue settled. "Tomorrow. I'll go buy a gun tomor -"
The telephone rang. Doug had turned the answering machine off, and in his haste to get up and race to the phone in the kitchen he overturned his salad plate and spilled some of the oil and vinegar dressing on the front of his pinstriped pants. "Hello?" he said. "Yes, right here." Laura followed him into the kitchen, and she said, "Take off your pants."
"What?" Doug covered the mouthpiece. "Huh?"
"Your pants. Take them off. The oil'll set in if I don't put something on it."
"Okay." He unzipped them, unhooked the braces, and let his pants fall to his ankles. He was wearing argyle socks with his wingtips. "I'm listening," he said to the caller. "Uh-huh. Yeah." His voice was tight. He took off his shoes and then his pants and gave them to Laura. She went to the sink, ran the cold water, and rubbed some on the oil spots. The dry cleaner would have to repair the damage, but at least the oil wouldn't leave a permanent stain if she applied a little first-aid. "Tonight?" she heard Doug say incredulously. "No way! The paperwork isn't due until next week!"
Oh no, she thought. Her heart sank. It was the office, her constant rival. So much for Doug's night at home. Damn it, couldn't they leave him alone long enough for –
"I can't come in," Doug said. "No. Positively not." A pause. Then: "I'm at home having dinner, Eric. Cut me some slack, okay?"
Eric Parker, Doug's superior at Merrill Lynch. This was a bad sign.
"Yeah. All right." She saw his shoulders slump. "All right, just give me -" He glanced at the wall clock. "Thirty minutes. See you there." He hung up, let out a long breath, and turned toward her. "Well, that was Eric."
There was nothing she could say. Many nights he got telephone calls that stole him away from home. Like the rise of burglaries, that, too, was on the increase. "Damn," he said quietly. "It's something that has to be taken care of tonight. I'll try to be back by -" Another glance at his enemy the clock. "Two hours. Three at the most."
That meant four, Laura thought. She looked down at his less-than-muscular legs. "Better find another pair of pants, then. I'll take care of these."
Doug walked back to the master bedroom while Laura took the oil-spattered pants to the laundry room off the kitchen. She rubbed a little Gain on the spots and left Doug's pants on the dryer. Then she went to the dining room to finish her dinner, and in another moment Doug returned wearing khakis, a light blue shirt, and a gray Polo sweater. He sat down and wolfed his casserole. "I'm sorry about this," he said as he helped Laura carry the dishes into the kitchen. "I'll make it as quick as I can. Okay?"
"Okay."
He kissed her cheek, and as he leaned into her he placed his hand on her belly again. Then he was gone out the kitchen door to the garage; she heard the Mercedes start up and the garage door open. Doug backed out, the garage door closed with a thunk, and that was that.
She and David were alone.
"Well," she said. She looked at Burn This Book, there on the countertop where Doug had left it. She decided to finish it tonight and start on the Hollywood book. Then Laura scraped the dishes and put them into the dishwasher. Doug was being worked like a dog, and it wasn't fair. He was a workaholic anyway, and this pressure was only making it worse. She wondered what Eric Parker's wife, Marcy, had to say about her husband working so late on a rainy night. When had money become God? Well, there was no use fretting about it. She went into the laundry room and folded the pants over a wooden hanger. The creases weren't lined up exactly, and that imperfection would drive her nuts if she didn't correct it. Laura took the pants off the hanger and refolded them.
And something fluttered from a pocket.
It was a small green piece of paper. It came to rest on the linoleum tile near Laura's left foot.
She looked down at it.
A ticket stub.
Laura stood there with the pants halfway on the hanger. A ticket stub. She would have to pick it up, and that would require slow motion and a delicate balance. She leaned over, gripping an edge of the dryer, and retrieved the ticket. The muscles of her lower back spoke as she straightened up; they said we've been kind with you so far, don't push it. Laura started to throw the ticket stub into a trash can, but she paused with her hand halfway there.
What was the ticket for?
The theater's name was on it: Canterbury Six. Must be a shopping center cinema, she thought. One of those multiplexes. It was a new ticket. The green hadn't faded. Laura looked at the pants on the hanger. She reached into a pocket, found nothing but lint. Then the other pocket. Her hand brought out a third of a roll of peppermint Certs, a five-dollar bill, and a second ticket stub. Canterbury Six, it said.
She'd never been to the Canterbury Six in her life. Didn't even know where it was.
Laura wandered back into the kitchen, the two ticket stubs in her hand. Rain slapped against the windows, a brutal sound. She was trying to remember the last movie she and Doug had gone to see at a theater. It had been a couple of years, at least. She thought it had been The Witches of Eastwick, which was now old hat on HBO and Showtime. So why were these two ticket stubs in Doug's pocket?
She opened the phone book and looked up Theaters. The Canterbury Six was at a mall across town. She dialed the number and got a recorded message telling what films were showing: a mixture of teenage sex comedies, alien shoot-'em-ups, and Rambo clones. She put the receiver back into its cradle, and she stood staring at the clock on the kitchen wail.
Why had Doug gone to a movie and not told her? When did he have time to go see a movie? She knew she was skirting around the dangerous territory of the true question: whom had he gone with?
It was silly, she thought. There was a logical explanation. Sure there was. He'd taken a client to a movie. Right. Way across town for a drek picture? Hold it, she told herself. Stop right there, before you get crazy. There's nothing to this. Two ticket stubs. So what?
So… why had Doug not told her?
Laura turned on the dishwasher. It was fairly new, and made no noise but for a deep, quiet throbbing. She picked up Burn This Book, intending to go to the den and finish reading the philosophies and opinions of Mark Treggs. Somehow, though, she found herself at the telephone again. Nasty things, telephones were. They beckoned and whispered things that were better left unheard. But she wanted to know about the tickets. The tickets were as big as double Mt. Everests in her mind, and she couldn't see anything but their ragged edges. She had to know. She dialed the number of Doug's office.