“I’m afraid of you.”
I felt emotion well up at the base of my throat. “For Christ’s sake, baby, come on.” I sunk to my knees, put my hands in hers. “You know I’d never do anything to hurt you.”
Trembling, her eyes brimmed with tears. “The other night was—I mean, I’ve never seen you like that it—you were babbling and insisting all these crazy things had happened and I couldn’t calm you down or talk to you. You had a total collapse, a—a breakdown. That’s not normal, Alan. It’s not healthy.”
“I’m OK,” I told her. “I promise you, I’m OK.”
She removed one hand from mine and wiped her eyes. “Gene feels it could be extremely beneficial for you to go in and discuss what happened that night.”
“Who are you talking to, some patient?” I pulled my hands free and stood up. “Gene. What the hell’s he know about it? Is that who you were on the phone with just now?”
“Yes, we—”
“Getting awful cozy with that fuck, aren’t you?”
Her face dropped, the tears still staining flushed cheeks. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
I moved to the window. “Tell him to mind his own fucking business.”
“I went to him for help, Alan.”
“Well stop going to him for help. Leave him the hell out of it.” I grabbed either side of the window casing as a means of occupying my hands so I wouldn’t put them through the wall. “I’m not some nut who needs a psychiatrist. I’m not one of his fucking whacked-out patients.”
“I never said you were any of those things,” she answered softly. “I just thought it might be a good idea to go and talk with him about it, that’s all.”
“About what, exactly?” I pushed away from the window, turned back to her. “About what? What should we cover first, my nightmares? That maybe Bernard was some sort of deranged psychopath and had been for years? That maybe all the clues were right there in front of us all that time and for some unknown reason we chose to ignore them? That maybe no one—motherfucking no one—including myself are who or what I thought they were? That I’m seeing people who aren’t fucking there? Dead women and little boys in the dark—that’s a good one. Or how about that I know even more things happened in that factory—bad—evil things that I—I don’t want to remember, Toni, I—Christ almighty, they’ll lock me up, I…”
What began as choking sobs quickly evolved into violent, uncontrollable weeping. Without a word she opened her arms, and I went to her quickly. We held each other, arms and tears entwined for what seemed a very long time.
I held her face in my hands, looked into her eyes. “I need to handle this on my own. I know it seems crazy but something is happening, and it’s not in my mind. It’s real. I’m not insane.”
“I never said you were. But you’re having problems, you—”
“It’ll be all right. I need to find the truth now. I can’t ignore it anymore, it—it won’t let me, do you understand?”
She tried to smile as she touched my cheek, and for the first time I realized she was wearing only a long T-shirt and a pair of panties. The dark tint of her nipples showed through the thin fabric, erect and pressed against it as if trying to escape. She looked so helpless and afraid in the moonlight, as if her safety and sanity hinged solely on me, and perhaps it did. “I love you,” I told her. “No matter what, I always love you.”
Soft hands caressed my thighs, warm breath tickled my neck, and moments later Toni blended into focus above me. Soulful eyes blinked slowly, cradling history—our history—as her tongue flicked across my cheek, slid into my ear. My arms wrapped around her, fingers kneading firm buttocks, slinking gradually across her back and onto her shoulders. I felt myself harden between her legs, parting a soft tuft of hair there as she moved to meet me, raising her hips, arching her back, drawing me deeper. She slithered closer, her body moving like a python as she straightened her spine and lay on top of me, eyes holding mine as if fearful she might lose me in the dark.
When it was over she was by my side, her heart beating against me, warm fingers gently tracing the contours of my chest as we lay quietly in each other’s arms, winded and wet. It was the first time we’d made love in quite some time. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was because she feared it might be the last.
Everything trickled through my mind like falling rain: The cellar, the photograph of the woman none of us could identify, the tape, the nightmares, the hauntings, the abandoned factory. The madness. “Bernard wasn’t what we thought he was,” I said softly. Toni snuggled closer but said nothing. I knew she still didn’t believe me, but then, I’m not sure anyone did.
Until winter melted away, became spring, and the first body was found.
SPRING
CHAPTER 10
Near the end of Main Street, the train tracks curved off into a wooded area where the shrubbery and grass grew wild and tall. The track was laid on a raised hill of dirt topped with crushed stone that tunneled through the otherwise natural setting, snaking along for as far as the eye could see. Following the tracks had been a popular pastime since our preteen years, and later, while in high school, the particular section near the end of Main Street, the section right before it disappeared into the overgrown landscape, became a meeting place. Though on foot it was accessible within moments from the street, the uneven and wild terrain discouraged most adults, including the cops, and as a result kids recognized it as a good hangout spot. We were no exception, and often congregated there to smoke cigarettes, a joint, maybe drink a beer or two, or sometimes to take a walk with a girlfriend.
Beyond the bend of one section of track was a low field that could be reached by a narrow dirt road carved through the forest on the far end. The ground there was disturbed on a regular basis and hastily packed back into place. The grass grew only in sparse patches, and a tiny rundown shed sat at one corner. Everyone knew it housed some tools and things—nothing of interest—and except for Mr. McIntyre, Potter’s Cove’s only animal control person, no one ever went down there.
That afternoon we’d decided to skip the latter portion of the school day. Bernard was depressed; his dog Curly had died the night before. Bernard had found him behind the picnic table in his backyard just that morning. Apparently the dog had been hit by a car and had somehow managed to get to the yard, where it collapsed behind the table and died. Mr. McIntyre had taken Curly away in a large, heavy duty plastic garbage bag, and since we all knew the town used this field as a burial ground for animals, we knew where to find his final resting place.
“How come you didn’t just bury him in your yard?” I asked.
Bernard was sitting on the slope of hill between the tracks and the field below, a long piece of grass between his lips swaying with the wind. “I wanted to,” he said softly, “but he was so big Mom said we couldn’t dig up the yard like that even for Curly. She tried to hand me some line about how McIntyre would give him a good burial and all that—yeah, right.” His eyes, still trained on the field, narrowed. “That must be where he put him,” he said, pointing to a small patch of freshly turned earth in the distance. “You can tell that was just dug up. That must be where Curly is.”
I felt bad for Bernard. I’d lost my cat a few years before, and I knew even though we were fifteen and at a stage where maintaining our level of cool was paramount, he was in a lot of pain. He’d had Curly since he’d been a toddler, and we’d all known and loved the dog too. “What kind of asshole hits a dog and keeps going?” I said, standing behind him while doing my best to look anywhere but at the field.