A Human Element (8 page)

"At a command ceremony dinner," Andy explained and lit up a cigar, offering one to Ben. He puffed at it, after watching Andy do the same. A buzz filled his head mixed with the beer he had. Two became his limit nowadays and no heavy stuff. "It was held off base and she attended with her cousin who is a JAG officer here. I asked her to dance and that was it."

Ben understood. He needed no further explanation.

"This is her place, actually. She visited her family here years ago when she was eighteen and met some older captain. She ended up marrying the guy. He was killed soon after in the Persian Gulf and had a bundle of extra life insurance. So she was pretty well-off to buy a house here."

"You're one lucky guy," Ben said and raised his beer glass. He wondered if settling down was worth it.

"That's for sure. But what about you, man?"

Ben half smiled and flipped his bangs up. "Women? Forget about it. I should thank you for that, again. With the travel I do, I'm never home. I actually don't have a home. When I'm between jobs I usually rent a suite for a month somewhere and relax."

Andy studied him and leaned back, puffing on his cigar, then gazed at the blowing banyan trees silhouetted under the moon off his porch. Ben stared at them too. Banyan trees. The last time he had seen them he was being whipped, bent over a rock. He peered up toward the mountain knowing the Pali Lookout hung there over Honolulu, hiding its dirty secrets. He could see the menacing boulder in his mind waiting for its next victim to cry out on its hard surface, painting it with new blood. He looked back at Andy.

"Listen to me, my friend." Andy leaned forward and eyed Ben. "I don't know what happened to you here, whether it had to do with your childhood or some prostitute you wronged but I think you're still running away from it. You may have cleaned up your act but you're still alone. A loner."

This was not the conversation Ben envisioned. He didn't want to get serious. It hit him Andy had changed as much as he had in seven years.

"So, what's wrong with that? I jet-set with the rich, see the world for free, and get paid for it. Not a bad gig and I have you to thank for it. Maybe I'm not like you."

"You're definitely not like me, but it doesn't mean it can't be great for you too. And I'll tell you why. Because you're missing the big picture. It sounds corny, but love does make the world go 'round. You should stop running from it, and your past, and find it. Likini has changed my life."

"Good for you. But how the hell am I supposed to have a relationship traveling all the time. And I can count on this hand the one-night stands I've had when I'm not traveling."

"So, change your career. Give yourself a home base. You've been doing this for years now. You're smart, make a change."

That hadn't occurred to Ben. He liked his job because he didn't have to make excuses to himself for why he couldn't settle down. He also didn't think about having a home to go to every night as well. It felt safe. Just like getting his bone smooched by hookers rather than a girlfriend had been safe, although it turned out not to be. He still ran from his past and he knew it. It hit him with clarity in an instant.

"Likini knows my past and she's cool." Andy half-smiled at him. "Everyone has a past. It's your future you can change. You can't run forever."

Ben nodded. The two friends sat in silence smoking and finishing their beers.

"Just promise me you won't be heading down to NoHo while you're here." Andy joked to lighten the moment, and winked at him. "I don't want to be pulling your butt out of a jail cell. Some big Samoan might be sweet on your skinny ass and take a closer look when you're bending over to tie your shoe."

Ben couldn't help laughing. If Andy only knew how close to the truth he came. "Yeah, no hookers for me anymore. It's just me and Rosie, all the way."

"Dude, I'm telling you, get a regular woman. At least one you can keep on the back burner while you're traveling." He glanced toward the kitchen. "I found a real tiger in this one. She may act like a lady, but not behind closed doors!"

Andy slapped the table and the talk moved on to lighter topics with funny stories at sea, wedding plans, and raunchy jokes. Ben needed it. Maybe he didn't have a home or a girl, but in a way Andy had become his home. For now it was enough.

That night he dreamed. He stood at the lake on its shore. The stillness covered him in peaceful quiet. The moon shone high overhead painting the wave tops with gold that lapped at the water's edge. Something moved in the distance on the path leading around the lake. It was a girl. She walked toward him as if she knew him. Finally, she stood before him and smiled. He found himself smiling back.

She took his hand and stared at him with her large, brown eyes. She looked so lovely. Her hand was warm in his, her touch sent waves of yearning through his body. She reached up on her toes and kissed him. He squeezed her hand and found himself kissing her back. Their tongues intertwined in a soft, embracing dance. He gave himself to her mouth, falling into her sweet wetness. She put her hand behind his neck and pulled him closer.

"Ben, do you know what I am?" Her eyes held him in a trance.

"
Wha
t you are? What do you mean?"

"Come with me, I'll show you."

He followed her as she led him down the path. Then he looked up. Something green shone in the sky. The meteorite. It would crush them. She was leading them toward the spot where it would crash.

"No!" He pulled her with him to go back.

"Come." Her large eyes drew him into her.

"No, follow me," Ben urged. "Can't you see, it's coming!"

"Come." She caressed his hand. "It's where I belong. We can belong together."

"No!" He dropped her hand and ran. His legs pumped fast over the rocks and fallen logs on the path. He turned once. She still stood there under the moon. The green thing filled the sky behind her as it streaked toward them.

She was smiling.

Laura woke up to a vicious headache. It involved the kind of pain brought on by a bad mix of tequila and beer. In the dark of her room she remembered dancing on the shuffle board table at P & G's bar with her roommate, Moe, and doing upside down margaritas. She groaned as she also remembered making out with Dennis Matthews from class and letting him feel her up at the bar.
Ughh
. She pulled herself up and staggered to her dresser mirror.

She switched on the light and groaned more. She also remembered she had let him give her hickies all over her neck in the quest to make the coolest shaped one. She didn't even like Dennis. She groaned again. The only two guys she had been with in college weren't memorable. One she lost her virginity to in a walk-in closet at a house party. The other one she dated for a few months, but he went in pursuit of other girls.

Then she remembered that Moe's parents were coming over that night to take them out for dinner to celebrate their college graduation tomorrow. How could she hide these hickies? She couldn't wear a turtleneck because a May heat wave had settled over New Paltz, hanging in the air like a fire-breathing cloud.

Coffee, croissants, and water. Lots of water. And then more coffee. That's what she needed. She pulled on a T-shirt and jean shorts over her trim, and aching body, and inched her way to the kitchen. On the way she peered into Moe's room. The light from the hallway settled on a covered up lump in the darkened room that shifted in bed. Yep, dead to the world. She was better off not feeling this hangover. The microwave light blinked 11:15. They had five hours until Moe's parents hit town.

She chugged down the last two aspirin she could find with a glass of water and sat down on the ragged, brown-plaid sofa in the small living room. She closed her eyes to wait for the throbbing in her head to go away. Then she would force herself to walk to The Bakery down the street to get strong coffee and croissants. It was Laura's favorite food spot in town. She craved a carb-fest of feta-spinach croissant and pesto tortellini. Then she might have the energy to clean their dirty apartment before Moe's parents came.

The place wasn't much, but it was heaven compared to living in the dorms for two years. Her scholarship paid for most of her tuition along with her job at the campus bookstore and small student loans. The money saved from the sale of her parent's property helped pay for her living expenses.

But in three weeks they would be moving out. Laura, to North Jersey for a job in communications with a large corporation, and Moe, to New York City for an advertising job. They would be peons making peon money to start.

Moe and her parents had been her family for the last four years, ever since she met Moe as a roommate on her first day on campus. She had been a couple of days late getting there, still in shock over her parents' death. Then Moe strolled into the room all tall, blonde, and bubbly. She was built like a football player and just as loud.

"Hey, it's the late arrival. You got a fake I.D.? Man, do I need a drink! My brain is already fried from trekking across this dinosaur of learning!"

Laura smiled for the first time in days and found herself chugging down a pitcher of beer at P & G's bar with Moe an hour later, after forging the worst fake I.D. in the history of the school. They became best friends from the beginning.

But on the big campus of New Paltz University Laura found herself having panic attacks getting to class. She felt terrified of crossing the campus amongst thousands of other people. Sitting in large lecture halls freaked her out. She felt trapped. The sweat would trickle down her armpits and the tickle in her throat would rise to a crescendo of spastic coughing attacks.

She would then flee the classroom as hundreds stared at her. Many days she retreated in her dorm room to eat Ramen noodles and watch
Mr. Ed
and
The Addams Family
on Moe's little black and white television all afternoon. It never occurred to her she bore a heavy burden grieving alone. Then the day came Moe yelled at her for not going to class.

"Why don't you go to class? You think you'll get to be the big-time reporter you want to be so bad if you skip class?" Moe glared at her, a backpack slung over her shoulder ready to head to class. "Are you too good to go? Is that it? Too smart for your own good? Because if you don't go they are going to start failing you and then what? Back home to the boonies you say you come from?"

"No." Laura huddled under the blanket with some dumb romance book. It took her mind off serious stuff.

"Well, I know for a fact you have journalism class in twenty minutes and that comforter is stuck to you like a wedgie in the crack of a sweaty, fat kid's ass."

"So what?" Laura tried not to laugh. "What's it to you, okay? Just leave me alone. Go on, get outta here."

"What's it to me? I'll tell you. Because if you get thrown out I get stuck with some nerd roommate who can't attract the hot guys when we go out, like you, that's what. And my whole social scene goes out the window and I never get laid again for the next four years. I'll practically become a virgin again. Technically, after four years of no sex, that's what happens."

"Doesn't sound as if you had too much trouble the other night, slut puppy." Laura threw back without looking up.

"I thought you were asleep." Moe tapped her foot.

"Who can sleep with your loud mouth getting banged?"

"That's it. You're pissing me off now. You better get your shit together because I don't want you to get kicked out and go back home."

The word
home
sent Laura into an emotional spiral. She pulled the comforter up to her forehead and willed the tears to stop. "I don't have a home, okay?"

Then the tears spilled down in a river of release and she let out a great sob. She waited for Moe to shut the door and leave, but she didn't. The comforter was pulled down off her face, and there stood Moe with a crooked smile.

"Okay, spill. Oh, wait, it looks like you are." Moe grinned. "I guess I can skip my class for once."

Laura told her about her parents dying in the fire right before she left for college, about her beloved home where she grew up, about her good friend, Mr. B, and her special lake. She even told her about the mysterious man in black who appeared every few years.

"Most likely he's got it for you bad, man." Moe laughed. "I mean look at you, you're smoking hot with that hair, those eyes, and that body. Has he ever touched you?"

"Well, no. And part of the time I was a kid anyways."

"Hmm, evil pedophile maybe?"

"No, he never came near me. Besides, he looks like somebody's big uncle."

"Yeah, sugar daddy uncle maybe. Did he call out crude comments?"

"No."

"Said, 'Hey, baby, wanna get it on?'"

"No!" Laura laughed.

"So there you go. He's a good guy. A guardian angel who ogles you from afar. Sure, you get a buff guardian angel in black. Me? With my big-boned dorkiness I'd get some fat slob with drool hanging off his mouth tripping over himself in awe to glimpse my Amazon beauty."

"You're not dorky," Laura insisted, but she felt better.

That night they stayed in crying and laughing. Moe hugged her and listened.

They whipped up frothy margaritas in their blender, dug around in their shared closet for tortilla chips and salsa, and spent hours chatting about boys and school like normal freshman girls do. Laura felt like a clean and empty bowl waiting to be filled up again.

But she never told Moe about her special powers. Since then, almost four years ago, she never did. She forced herself to forget about her strange abilities as well, and over time the thoughts of others faded from her mind. She now had a safe harbor with Moe and it helped free her from her past, a little bit.

After her parents died, Mr. B had convinced Laura to leave for college. She had no choice. She had nowhere else to go and she wanted to get as far away from Coopersville as she could. He helped her take care of the details like the cremations, the brief service at the church in town, and listing the land for sale.

She stayed with him those few days before she left for college and huddled in his loft bed, crying much of the time, until he told her it was time to go or she would miss the start of the semester. So Laura left for college in a fog and vowed to forget all she had known and been, except for Mr. B. He stayed the one good thing she could count on.

And now she was moving on again to start a career in communications for a large healthcare company in New Jersey. Moe had tried to persuade Laura to find a job with her in New York. Moe wanted to conquer the big city together, but Laura wouldn't be able to survive in a world of concrete and skyscrapers. She needed trees and space. At least New Jersey had some. She found a cute studio apartment next to a park where she could sit in her kitchen and look at the leaves changing. She wanted to be alone again.

Laura sighed and forced herself to get up from the couch, after concluding the hangover headache would not be cured by aspirin alone. She washed her face, threw her hair under a frayed baseball cap, and brushed her teeth hard to eliminate the metallic taste in her mouth from a night of drinking. Feeling near normal, she drew on sunglasses to hide her puffy eyes and headed out for much needed sustenance at The Bakery. She grabbed a coffee cake and quart of orange juice too, just in case Moe's parents stopped in for breakfast before graduation on Saturday. She felt comforted knowing they were coming in town.

After years of spending holidays and vacations with them, they became the family she lost. From the moment she met them—and Moe embellished them with her tale of woe—they took her in under their wing and granted her daughter status. Moe's mother, in a way, reminded Laura of her own mother. She was a big, bosomy woman, as tall as Moe, who would crush you in a floral-scent filled hug.

Outside of Mr. B they were all she had. She wished he could make the graduation ceremony but he had a bad cold. At eighty-three he had slowed down but his mind was still sharp and witty. As she waited in line at The Bakery to pay, she made a mental note to go visit him this summer.

The sun shone high overhead as she walked back to the apartment. Sweat trickled down her back in an uncomfortable drip. It proved to be another humid, hot day. The headache that had subsided came crashing back in painful waves. She pressed her palm to her forehead and wiped the sweat away.

This wasn't a hangover headache. This was the same headache she had as a child. The familiar pain blinded her and she stumbled down the narrow street back to the apartment. She hung onto the railing heading up the stairs and fumbled with her keys to get in the door. She had to get out of the light and lie down. She needed more aspirin and Moe had to have more in her room.

"Moe," Laura called out but got no answer. She must really be hung over to still be asleep. Through squinted eyes, Laura saw the microwave glowing a fuzzy 12:55 p.m.

She shoved the food into the fridge and shielding her eyes from the bright kitchen light, shuffled to Moe's room and pushed open the door. She opened her eyes wider to the cool, blessed dark. The pain enveloped her head in a stabbing vise. A smell invaded Laura's nose. An overpowering coppery smell. She gagged. Fresh waves of it hit her. She bent over holding her side.

"Moe? Sleepy head, get up. You didn't get sick in here did you?"

Laura stood up. Moe's outline rose from the bed in the dimness. Laura felt herself along the bed with one hand while covering her nose with the other to ward of the stench. The comforter was pulled all the way up over Moe's head.

"Moe?" Laura whispered again, this time fear snaked its way down into the pit of her stomach. She shook the top of the comforter. It felt wet. She pulled it down and shook Moe but felt wet, floppy rags. She pulled away. Both her hands dripped with warm, wetness. She gagged again, afraid she would throw up, and jumped back to the wall.

"Moe!" She shrieked now and scraped her hands along the wall reaching for the light switch. "Where is it? Where is it?"

At last she forced it up and closed her eyes from the glare. When she opened them red ran down her fingers and arms. Her red handprints decorated the wall in a pretty border. It wasn't vomit. Moe hadn't thrown up on herself. Blood spread slowly to stain the comforter. Its crimson circle grew larger. Laura stared at the cover, poked up in clumps hiding Moe's face. She shook off her paralysis and ripped back the comforter with both hands and screamed.

Moe's eyes bulged from her head and her lips were pulled back in a twisted, silent scream. Her hands faced palms to defend off something in her final, terrifying moments. But it was her neck Laura stared at. Those weren't rags she felt in the dark, but the pieces of Moe's neck flapping open. Her neck had been savagely ripped open. Claw marks whipped around her wounds. Blood pumped out of a gaping hole in Moe's neck.

Laura fell to her knees at the bottom of the bed and twisted the end of the comforter over and over. She felt herself falling into a dark pit where no one could follow. It was her parents' death all over again. She punched herself over and over in the gut in anger and grief. She wanted to hurt as those she loved hurt. All the normalcy of the past four years became erased in this room.

"Come get me, you freak!" Laura sobbed into the air. "I'm waiting."