"Believe me, Peg, it'll be better. Turn off the light."
Afraid to disobey — what if something horrible touched her again? — she reached out and pulled the chain and turned off the light, and in the blessed shield of darkness she sat up, reached forward, grabbed the covers, and pulled them up over herself as she lay back down. All the way over herself, head and everything.
"Peg?"
"Wha?"
She could feel him shifting around, changing position on the bed, sitting there beside her. "You feel a little better, Peg?"
She did. It was stupid, but she did. Just not seeing him — well, she wouldn't be able to see him anyway, but in the darkness there was no way to know you couldn't see him. "A little," she admitted, but kept the covers over her head just the same.
"Peg," said Freddie's voice in the darkness, outside the covers, "let me tell you what happened. I went to a place to get some stuff tonight, and these two doctors grabbed me and held a gun on me."
"Doctors?"
"Some kinda doctors. It was a lab kinda place, with equipment I could turn over pretty easy, so I went in, and they got me, and they made me this deal."
"Freddie, that is you there, isn't it?"
"Sure it's me, Peg," Freddie said, and patted her through the covers, and the funny thing was, the pat was comforting. As long as she couldn't see that she couldn't see him, things were okay. Almost normal.
She sighed. She relaxed one tiny notch. She said, "Okay, Freddie. What happened?"
"They made me this deal," Freddie said. "I'd help them with this experiment, or they'd call the cops. I mean, one option was, they don't call the cops. They were doing cancer research and they had this medicine and they needed to test it on a person. And there was this other stuff that was the antidote, in case something went wrong. So I went along with them—"
"Sure."
"— and as soon as I could I got out of there and took the stuff I came for and took the antidote and come right home. And you know I don't like to turn the light on when you're asleep . . ."
"I know."
"So that's what it is," Freddie said, and sighed.
Peg tentatively moved her head out from under the covers, like a turtle. She looked in the blackness toward the sound of his voice, pretending she'd be able to see him if the light was on. "What's what it is, Freddie?" she asked.
"The antidote didn't work," Freddie said. "I don't know what the hell all this has to do with cancer research, but I see what they did to me. Peg?"
"Yes, Freddie?"
"I'm invisible, Peg," Freddie said. "Isn't that a bitch?"
He sounded so forlorn, so lost, that she couldn't help it, her heart went out to him. "Oh, come here, Freddie," she said, reaching out, finding his arm, pulling him close.
"I'm sorry, Peg," Freddie said, sliding in under the covers.
"It's not your fault," she said, arms around him, caressing him.
"Aw, thanks, Peg," Freddie said, and kissed her, and pretty soon they were heading back toward where they'd been going in the first place.
"One thing," Peg said, as Freddie's comforting weight settled upon her.
"What's that, Peg?"
"Don't turn on the light."
"Don't worry," Freddie said.
6
It's hard to service a body you can't see. Freddie's bathroom experiences in the morning were more complex than usual. Shaving turned out to be the easiest part of it — if maybe the least necessary, all things considered — since he was used to shaving in the shower, where he couldn't look at his face anyway. The worst, particularly in the shower, was that he could see through his eyelids. Now, when a person closes his eyes it's because he wants them closed. He doesn't want to see water spraying straight down from the shower fixture onto his eyeballs, and he certainly doesn't want to watch the soapy outline of knuckles, in extreme close-up, squidging deep into his eyes.
Still, he eventually finished, his towel swooping and swirling in what seemed to be an empty room, and came out to dress — shoes and socks and pants okay, but the polo shirt had these round openings for arms and neck, and nothing there — and by that time Peg was back. She'd taken one look at him this morning — or, rather, she'd taken one look at where she'd thought he might be, judging by the sounds he was making — and she'd said, "I don't need this, Freddie. I'll be right back." And off she'd gone.
And now she was back, in the kitchen, and when Freddie walked in she stood up from her breakfast of dry toast and black coffee, looked at the round openings in the polo shirt, and said, "I thought it was gonna be like that. I can't do anything about the hands, but there's your head." And she gestured at the butcher-block counter between the sink and the refrigerator.
Freddie went over to look. Peg had gone to one of those party-supply places, or tourist-junk places — whatever. And here on the butcher block were four full-head latex masks: Dick Tracy, Bart Simpson, Frankenstein's monster, and the Ayatollah Khomeini. Freddie said, "Khomeini?"
"It was marked down. The way I look at it," Peg said, "you've got kind of a mood thing there. You go through the day, you can decide who you feel like."
"If I ever feel like Frankenstein," Freddie said, "you better worry."
"I figure you'll mostly be Bart Simpson," Peg told him.
"Have a cow," Freddie agreed morosely, beginning to feel sorry for himself. He sighed, and said, "Peg, how do I eat through one of those?"
"I don't wanna know about it." Picking up her toast and coffee, she said, "I think we don't eat together anymore. I'll be in the living room. When you come in, be one of those fellas, okay?"
"Okay, Peg." Freddie sighed again. "Being an invisible guy," he said, "is kind of a lonely job, isn't it?"
Taking pity on him, Peg said, "Maybe it'll go away pretty soon."
"Maybe."
"Or we'll adapt, we'll get used to it."
"You think so?"
"Eat your breakfast, if you can find your mouth," Peg told him. "Then come in and we'll talk."
She left the kitchen, and Freddie poured orange juice and coffee, then popped a couple fake waffles into the toaster. Sitting alone at the small kitchen table, feeling more and more sorry for himself, he ate his breakfast, lifted his shirt to find out if he could still see the food he'd just eaten, and looked in at a bowl of succotash and soy sauce, without the bowl. Lowering the shirt and averting his gaze, he decided he wouldn't mention this part of the experience to Peg. Nor let her discover it for herself, if at all possible.
The visual replay of breakfast so discouraged him he almost went into the living room without his new head. In the doorway, in the nick of time, he remembered, and made a U- turn.
His choosing of Dick Tracy was a kind of self-therapy, an attempt to lighten his mood through the therapeutic use of comedy. He was a crook, see, and Dick Tracy was a cop. Get it? Well, it was a try.
Peg didn't help much. Looking up from Newsday, "Ah, the Dick head," she said.
"Thanks, Peg."
"That isn't what I meant. Sit down, Freddie, let's talk."
"It's hot inside here," Freddie complained, sitting in his favorite chair, across from the TV.
"If you want to talk to me," Peg told him, "you'll keep it on."
"I'm just saying." Whenever Freddie sighed, inside the latex mask, it ballooned slightly, as though Dick Tracy had recurring mumps.
Peg frowned at him, discontented. After a minute, she said, "Freddie, could you possibly put on a long-sleeve shirt?"
"This is becoming a pain," Freddie announced, but he obediently got up and went into the bedroom, coming back two minutes later in a long-sleeved blue work shirt with the cuffs turned back just once and the bottom of the Dick Tracy head tucked into the collar. "Okay?"