Part 17 (1/2)
”What was wrong with Joey?” he asked.
”Bad dream,” she mumbled.
Jack was in the bathroom dressing for work the next morning when he heard Liz shout down the hall, ”What the h.e.l.l is this mess?”
He tucked in his s.h.i.+rt, swept his hair to the side with his hand, and came out into the hall.
”That's the gla.s.s you heard last night.”
”What are you talking about? I didn't hear any gla.s.s last night. I heard Joey crying.”
”No,” Jack said. ”You woke me up saying something had broken. You were half-asleep still, so you probably don't remember it, but you did.”
”I remember going to Joey's room because he'd had a bad dream.”
”And I came in a bit later because I'd been in here fixing this.” He put his keys in his pocket and slid into his shoes. ”I'm gonna call someone today to come and fix it right.”
”Did you get--?”
”Yes. I got . . . well I got as much as I could. I'm pretty sure I got it all. If there's anything left, it's dust. If you want, I can vacuum it up before I go.”
”No,” she said. ”Never mind. I just didn't sleep that well. I was dreaming something about swimming, but it was so hot last night.”
He kissed Joey goodbye. Joey wiped his cheek and went back to his cartoons, slurping cereal from his spoon.
”What are you talking about? It was the coolest night it's been in weeks.”
”I don't know. I don't. Forget it. I'm just still tired.”
”Well, when he takes a nap, go lay down.”
”I'm sure I will.”
Jack kissed his wife and went to work. Liz told Joey to watch cartoons while she took a bath, and then they'd find something to do.
For the first time in forever, Joey wanted to go to the park. If Liz had known Joey's dreams, she'd have guessed it was because the terror in them had moved from the park to the house. So for Joey Upper Hill Park was no longer a threat, but his own house was.
Liz watched him from the corner of her eye while focusing most of her attention on a book. After taking the haunted house and remodeling books back to the library, she'd grabbed a few paperbacks and was making her way through them. One sat finished on top of the television, one sat untouched next to it. One rested in her hands, spread open.
Joey yelled at her from the top of the slide and she waved at him before he vanished behind the guard and began the swirl to the bottom.
She turned her eyes back to her book and found her place just as a voice from beside her said, ”Cute boy.”
Liz looked up and over to see the grinning idiot smiling at her. She smiled back and said, ”Yeah, we're fond of him.” She went back to her book. The grinner persisted.
”Yeah, he's gonna have a hundred girlfriends when he gets older.”
”Yep.”
”How old is he?”
”Six.”
”Oh, he's big for his age.”
”Uh-huh.”
Liz chided herself for being rude. You've been here how many months already? You don't know anyone here. You have no one to talk to except your husband and stepson, and this woman--who's perfectly nice--is trying to say h.e.l.lo, and you're brus.h.i.+ng her off.
That's because, nice or not, she's a grinning idiot. Do I want her hanging out with me all the time? No.
”I kinda figured he was yours,” the woman said. Her grin, so far, had yet to decrease in width. ”I wasn't too sure with his hair, but it's almost darkened to your shade. It'll be there before too long.”
Liz had found her place and reread the same line three times.
”I'm sorry?” she asked. ”What?”
”His hair,” the woman pointed to him. ”It'll be there 'fore too long.”
Liz smiled and nodded, then looked at Joey. And she saw the woman was right. His hair was darker. It was no longer the bright blonde it was when they moved here. Now he sported dirty strawberry-blonde hair. She watched him play for a few minutes, laughing and running, and wondered when that had happened. She thought hair was supposed to lighten in the summertime.
”You live just a few houses down, don't you?”
Liz looked at her for a second, trying to figure out if she recognized this woman.
”You live in the big house? Next to the empty lot.”
”Right,” Liz said. ”Yeah, we just moved in. You live across the street?”
”Across the street and up the hill a little way,” the woman said. ”I think you'll like it here. This is a good neighborhood, for the most part.”
”Is it? You've been here a while?”
”Of course. I grew up in Angel Hill. Used to live in the West End, but that's no good over there, too many hoodlums. I've been in North End almost twenty years now--ten of it right there in the same house--and you couldn't get me to move back even if it was rent-free.”
Liz yelled for Joey and he came over.
”We're gonna go home in a minute, okay? It's about time for lunch.”
He protested, whining a little.
”But I'm not ready to go home yet. Can't I have a few more minutes?”
She agreed and they stayed a little longer, then finally gathered their things--Liz's book, her keys, Joey's shoes which he'd taken off soon after they got to the park--and walked the block and a half home.
After lunch, Joey fell asleep quickly, despite his struggles to stay awake. And in his bed, with the air conditioner from his parents' room cooling him, he dreamed.
The same dream; Joey ran through the black house, trying to find something, the best hiding place, or, if he were really lucky, Jack or Liz. He'd covered the bottom floor and found only locked rooms. On the second floor, it was the same. The bathroom was locked; the door between the main room and the dining room was closed and locked as well. Through the beveled gla.s.s in the door, he saw people sitting around the dining room table, eating a fancy dinner with candles and bottles of wine, laughing and talking and not realizing he was there. He didn't know these people, had never seen them before, and he found himself stuck between trusting that they were better than the man chasing him, and the fear that they might be the same as him. He watched, but only for a second, trying to decide. Finally he decided that in this place he wouldn't trust anyone, except his dad or Liz.
He turned toward the stairs again and went to the third floor.