"I . . . don't think we should go out on the lake in the dark."
She said softly and invitingly, "I trust you."
Wayne looked over his shoulder at the house, where kids were dancing on the patio. He had a strange sense of isolation, a feeling that all wasn't right and he should know what was wrong, but it evaded him. Wasn't it right, he thought, that he should be a human being too?
"Let's do it, sweet thing," the girl whispered.
Wayne had to step through the water to shove the canoe off. He slipped into it, almost capsizing them and bringing a squeal of laughter from her; then they were gliding through the dark water, leaving the party noise behind.
"See?" Lonnie said. "Ain't this nice?"
Wayne heard water rolling in the bottom of the canoe. His expensive loafers were getting ruined. The moon was rising, an amber scythe that looked so close and sharp you could cut your throat on it. Bullfrogs croaked from the shore, and the night closed around the drifting canoe.
Lonnie sighed deeply, a sexy, needful sigh, and Wayne thought his head might crack open like an eggshell. "There's somethin' awful familiar about you," she said. "It's your voice, I guess. Do I know you from somewhere?"
"No."
The music faded to a low murmur. The Dickerson house was a distant glow on the shore.
A dark object lay ahead. Wayne said, "What's that?" and then the canoe grazed a square wooden diving platform. He took the paddle out of the water and held it over his knees. His heart was beating harder, and when Lonnie's voice came, it was like balm on a fever blister. "We could rest here for a little while."
He almost laughed. Rest? Oh, she was a sinful Jezebel! She wanted him, he knew. She wanted to be naked for him, and to do it, "If you want to," he heard himself say, as if from a stranger's mouth.
Wayne found a rope trailing from the platform and tied up the canoe. Then he was helping Lonnie out onto the platform, and she was pressing herself against him and he could feel her breasts, her nipples jutting against his chest. His heart was pounding, his head was filled with heat and he couldn't think.
"I'm cold," she whispered. "Please hold me, I'm cold."
He put his arms around her, and realized it was he who was trembling.
Lonnie pulled him down onto the platform, as lake water chuckled around them and the smell of moss drifted up. A dam of pent-up passions cracked inside Wayne—she wants to do it and there's nobody to see, nobody to know!—and he fumbled at her clothes, his breathing harsh. His hands roamed over her body, as she held him close and whispered urgings in his ear. Her blouse came open. Wayne worked at her bra and then her breasts were free and warm against his hands. Her body pressed against his as his penis throbbed with heat. She rubbed at his crotch and then began pulling his belt loose, her teeth nipping at his neck. His pants started coming down. "Hurry," she whispered. "Hurry hurry, please ..."
His penis was exposed as his underwear came down, and the girl put her hand on it.
And Wayne heard in his head the crack of his father's voice like a lash across his back: Sinner! Would you lie down with Jezebel?
He was excited and dizzy, his eyes squeezed shut, his mind tormented between what he wanted and what he knew he shouldn't do. She gripped his penis, and he opened his eyes.
He was no longer in the embrace of a girl.
It was something that looked like a beast, a wild boar, red-eyed and grinning.
Wayne tried to pull away, but then the vision passed and it was Lonnie again, dark-haired Lonnie, faceless Lonnie.
Sinner! Would you lie with Jezebel?
"No!" Lonnie said. "Make it big again! Make it big!"
"I . . . can't . . . I . . ." He was concentrating, trying as hard as he could. His father's voice rang in his brain, a bass rumble of Doom: Sinner! He'd go to Hell for lying with a harlot, he'd been tricked by Satan into coming out here!
"Make it big!" Lonnie was saying, a note of anger and frustration in her voice. She handled his penis like a small twig. "Come on, can't you get it up?" After another minute or two, she released him and sat over on the platform's edge, putting her bra and blouse back on.
"I'm sorry," he said, hurriedly getting his pants on. He felt slimed by the Jezebel's touch, but wicked needs and desires still coursed through him. "Next time," he said. "It's just ... I don't feel right about this. Okay?"
"Forget it. I need a man, not a little boy who can't even get it up! Come on, take me back to shore!"
Her voice was ugly. The sound of it scared Wayne. "I just . . . you won't tell anybody about this, will you?"
"What's wrong with you? Are you queer?"
"No! Please . . . you won't tell anybody, will you?"
Lonnie buttoned her blouse. He saw her head tilted to one side, as if in concentration. Then, slowly, she turned toward him. "Why not? It'd be somethin' for a laugh, wouldn't it?"
"Satan's in you," he whispered. "That's it, isn't it?"
"What?" He thought she smiled in the darkness.
"You're a Jezebel, a dirty sinner and oh God I shouldn't have come out here!"
"Now I know where I've heard your voice!" the girl said and Wayne cringed. "My momma made me listen to that Crusade crap on the radio! You're—oh, wow! You're the little healer himself, ain't you?" She whooped with laughter. "Yeah! You're Little Wayne Falconer! Oh, wow, everybody's gonna laugh their—"
"No," he said forcefully, and she was silent. "You're not going to tell anybody."
"Who says? Take me back or I'll start screamin'!"
He had to make her understand! He had to make her see he was a righteous boy! He took a step toward her.
And then Lonnie abruptly turned toward shore and yelled, "HELP!"
"Shut up!" he hissed, and pushed her. She staggered across the platform.
"HELP!" she shouted again, her voice echoing across the water.
Wayne exploded. He pushed her as hard as he could, and suddenly Lonnie's feet slipped out from under her on the moss-slick boards. She fell backward, her arms windmilling. There was a violent, sickening crunch! as the side of her head hit a corner of the platform.
She fell into the lake, and the black water covered her.
At once Wayne reached down to grasp her, but she was gone. Bubbles burst upward, smelling of lake mud. He leaned down, whining with panic, and thrust his arms underwater to find her. He got up, ran across the platform to the canoe to retrieve the paddle, and used that to probe the depths. He looked up toward the house, and started to scream for help. No! he thought. She's not hurt, she's all right! She only bumped her head a little bit, she'll come up in just a few seconds!
"Lonnie!" he whispered. "Come on up, now! Come on!"
Black water sighed around the platform. He reached underwater again—and felt her hair. He gripped it and wrenched upward. It was a rotten tree limb with a green mane of algae.
He started to ease himself into the water to look for her, but realized that if he got wet everyone would know at the party. She was probably swimming to shore.
"Lonnie?" he called out, a little louder. Only crickets and bullfrogs answered.
After a while he began to cry, and he prayed as he'd never prayed before. The dark voice in his mind whispered, She was a Jezebel a dirty sinner and she deserved what she got! He sat on the platform for a long time, shaking, his head bowed.
Wayne was sitting in the Camaro's backseat when Terry and Helen found him about an hour later. His face was very pale. The gin got to him, Terry thought.
"Where've you been, Wayne?" Terry asked as he slipped behind the wheel. "We were lookin' for you."