Ain't no security against the invisible man; no, sir.
The first thing Freddie did, when he knew he was alone in the building, was skip down the hall, waving his invisible arms and kicking his invisible feet, knowing nobody would be coming around that corner to knock him down, not even his old friend Superfly. And the second thing he did was go into the nearest storage room and find a fur coat that fit and put it on.
June, shmoon; Freddie was cold.
13
By five-thirty, Peg had to go to the bathroom bad. Freddie should have signaled to her by now, but he hadn't, because of course the employees should have left by now, and they hadn't, which meant she couldn't avail herself of the fur-storage building's ladies' room.
Before they'd come out here, she'd talked this situation over with Freddie, or at least with the volume of air she'd assumed contained Freddie, and she'd asked him how come they had to deal with Jersey Josh Kuskiosko all the time? Aside from Jersey Josh's personality, which was the pits, why not just steal cash, and cut out the middleman? Take 100 percent instead of 10 percent? And Freddie had said, "What cash? There aren't any big piles of cash around. Payrolls are by check. Big stores take credit cards."
"Banks have cash," she'd pointed out. "You could sneak in, wait till they close—
"Bank security is not simple, Peg," the air had told her. "Bankers are serious about money, that's one thing I'm sure of. You never know what you're gonna find in a bank. Heat sensors, motion sensors; they don't have to see me to know I'm there. The real money is locked away so no one naked guy without tools is ever gonna get at it. I know Jersey Josh is kind of an irritation—"
"I can put up with him, if I have to," Peg had said, being brave. "As long as you're there with me."
"I'm sorry, Peg, but that's just the way it is. All I can take is merchandise, and convert it to cash. I could start, maybe, a new relationship with a new fence . . ."
"Would he be any better?"
"Probably worse. You know, guys who go into that business, being a fence, they're not your Albert Schweitzer mostly."
So here they were, in pursuit of more merchandise. Over there, more delivery trucks backed in to the loading zone, maneuvering backward up a driveway so hemmed in by tall chain-link fence that most drivers didn't even try to get out of their vehicle. Peg watched them, and thought about the diner she and Freddie had passed on Astoria Avenue on their way over here, and thought about Freddie finally coming out of that building to make the signal and nobody around to receive the signal, and at last she decided enough was enough. Bladder-wise, enough was too much.
Leaving the area, Peg drove past the fur building and noticed that across the street from it was a parking lot with a sign that read AFFILIATED FUR STORAGE PARKING ONLY. The lot was better than half full. Employee cars, they must be. If they're gone when I get back, Peg told herself, then Freddie will be ready for me. So there is a signal after all, whether I'm here or not.
At the diner, Peg relieved herself and ordered a coffee and a doughnut to go, because she didn't feel right about just using the ladies' and then walking out. When she drove back to take up her vigil, the cars were all still in that lot, so nothing had changed. Peg settled down again, a bit more comfortably, to wait.
An hour went by. The second hour since Freddie'd left the van. An hour in which Peg drank the coffee but didn't eat the doughnut. An hour that gave her a lot of time for thought, for private rumination. And the longer she had to think, and the more she pondered this situation in which she found herself, the gloomier she became. Gloomier, and then gloomier.
What it came down to was, an invisible boyfriend was no fun. You just didn't get used to being around such a person, having their voice suddenly come at you from over there when you thought they were over here, having the TV channel-changer float in the air while Freddie was surfing for something to watch, seeing those sudden indentations and abrupt puffings-up, and other signs of Freddie's movements, his presences and absences.
What made it even worse, you could never be sure when he was looking at you. We all like privacy sometimes, to be alone with our thoughts, or our bodies, but these two hours in the van were the longest stretch Peg had had to herself — to be herself — in the last eight days. There was no privacy when you lived with an invisible man. He got all the privacy, and you got none. Never knowing when you're under observation, whether he's behind you or in front of you, never knowing how you look. At this particular moment, do you look sexy and pretty and thin, or do you look foolish or ugly or stupid? Or just merely cranky, probably, most of the time.
And of course Freddie, being a man, hadn't the slightest idea anything was wrong. He just went blithely on, being invisible, half the time in the apartment forgetting his Bart Simpson head, never wearing the gloves, never giving a second thought to the effect he was having on the person with whom he shared the apartment.
Which might be unfair, actually, though Peg wasn't in much of a mood to give Freddie the benefit of the doubt. But the other problem with living with an invisible man was the fact you can't see him. It wasn't merely that you can't see him, you can't see him. You can't see the expression on his face, can't tell if he's pleased or miserable, can't tell if he's bored or excited, can't tell what's going on. We all of us to some extent chart our voyages through life based on the weather occurring in our loved ones, but with an invisible man you can never tell what the weather is. The voice gives some clues, the words give some clues, but where are the facial expressions? Where's the body language? Where's the goddamn body?
I don't know how much more of this I can put up with, Peg thought. There, the thought was out.
So were the people. All at once, people were coming out of the fur-storage building a block and a half away, streaming across the street to the parking lot, calling out words to one another, waving, getting into their cars. A little pocket rush-hour now took place on the street in front of Affiliated Fur Storage, and then they were all dispersed, leaving only a little white security-company car parked at the gate. Five minutes later, as Peg watched, no longer impatient, no longer bored, happy and interested now that something was happening, three bulky men in brown uniforms came out of the building, paused to lock the front gate, then clambered into the little car and drove away.
Peg didn't wait for a signal from Freddie. She knew that place down there was empty, she knew he was in there dismantling the alarm system, she knew it would be only a very few minutes before he came out with a white towel or a roll of fax paper or something to wave at her, so she started the van and eased it slowly forward, through and beyond the intervening intersection.
The seltzer bottler and the uniform laundry, not being seasonal businesses with a high-volume June, had both shut for the day more than an hour ago. This was strictly a commercial area around here, with no pedestrians ever and no traffic after business hours. Peg had the world to herself as she drove on down the street, and was pulling up in front of the loading entrance to Affiliated when the garage door back in there lifted and out walked a fur coat, holding a white plastic in-tray in its nonexistent hand. "Oh, Freddie," Peg muttered, and just for a moment closed her eyes.