Between Friends (3 page)

Dallas opened a compartment on her knapsack and dug in hastily for a pencil. She ripped a sheet of paper from a notebook and handed them to him. While he wrote something down, she looked him over again. His head tilted down at an angle, and she could see something about him that seemed familiar. Suddenly he gazed up at her and handed her the paper.

“Here. Just in case. You can always leave a message for me, and I’ll get back to you.”

She nodded, accepting the paper and stuffing it into the pocket of her jacket. She had no intention of ever using it. “What about you? Are you going to get in trouble?”

“I can take care of myself.” He squinted at her. “You’d better comb your hair or something and change clothes before your folks see you.”

She reached up and touched her hair. It was a mess. Wild and loose.

Alex slowly began backing away. He pushed his hands in the pockets of the jacket. The movement caused his elbows to stick out from his slender body. To Dallas it made him look somehow lonely and displaced.

“Maybe I’ll see you around sometime …” he said before turning to walk quickly back up Chatham.

Dallas watched him disappear in the distance. When she couldn’t see him anymore it was almost as if he’d never existed. Nonetheless, she believed that Alex Marco would keep his word and not say anything to Vin or Lillian about what happened. She believed that Alex could take care of himself if Nicholas tried to start in on him again. But Dallas also believed that there was no chance that she’d ever see him again.

T
HE VOLUME ON THE
telephone was as low as it could be, and still its trilling sound startled her ruthlessly from sleep. Her mind, suspended somewhere in an unfinished dream, quickly shifted into semiconsciousness. She reached for the receiver before the phone could ring a second time.

Something must be wrong.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Dallas. It’s … me,” came back the deep and throaty answer.

Dallas recognized the voice on the other end. “Val, what’s wrong? It’s not Megan Marie, is it? Your family?”

As she asked the question Dallas pulled herself up into a half-sitting position, her shoulders supported by pillows and the headboard. She glanced at the green-illuminated digital numbers on the clock radio: 1:53
A.M.

There was sniffling and genuine distress, and the answer, when it finally came, was muffled through the folds of a Kleenex or handkerchief.

“No, no. Everyone is fine.”

Dallas unclenched the muscles in her neck and thighs. Her body relaxed. She swung her legs from the bed, pulling back the covers. “Hold on a minute. I’m going to switch phones.”

She put the call on hold and replaced the receiver. Once out of the bed she searched in the dark through the pile of clothing tossed haphazardly on the chair and floor. She found something large with sleeves and quickly thrust her arms into them. Dallas didn’t bother to button the shirt, but wrapped it instead across her breasts as she left the room and closed the door behind her. She padded barefoot down a short hallway and into the living room, expertly sidestepping the edge of the wicker trunk that served as a coffee table. She let out a sleepy yawn and climbed onto the sofa, settling into a corner and digging her toes under a cushion. Slouching down comfortably, Dallas reached for the extension, prepared to listen to Valerie Holland’s latest complaint or problem.

“You still there?” Dallas asked, fitting the phone between ear and shoulder.

“Yeah, I’m here.”

“You just about gave me a heart attack, Val. I won’t even remind you what time it is.”

“I’m sorry. I … I didn’t even think about the time. Did I interrupt anything?”

“Just my sleep. Not that it would have mattered to you anyway,” Dallas responded.

She absently massaged her fingertips through her scalp, pulling and playing with the short, curly locks. Valerie never thought about the time. Dallas had learned that she either had to keep up with Valerie’s schedule or miss half the adventure.

“What’s wrong now? Did Matthew change his mind again about leaving his wife?” She heard a soft mewling sound and realized that Valerie was crying.

“Just don’t say I told you so,” Valerie said in a watery voice.

“I don’t have to. You knew all along what could happen. You know better than to get involved with a married man. Don’t you read
Ladies’ Home Journal
?” Dallas teased wryly. “They always go back to their wives, and you get hurt.”

“It … it’s not Matthew. I haven’t even seen him in weeks. I’m glad we don’t work together anymore.”

“Okay. So you’re not broken up over Matthew. You didn’t wake me up at almost two in the morning to tell me what a bastard he is.”

Valerie sniffed. “No …” She started to cry again in earnest.

Dallas’s eyes opened abruptly. She stared into the dark and frowned. “Val?” she prompted.

“Nicholas is dead,” Val sobbed.

For a moment the only thing Dallas could hear was the sounds of Valerie’s distress. Everything else was so quiet, like a void around the crying. The confusion she was suddenly experiencing had nothing to settle on.

“Nicholas …” Dallas repeated blankly, as if testing the sound of the name. For a moment Dallas had no idea who Valerie was talking about. Her memory sifted through all of Valerie’s boyfriends over the past several years.

“Who … who did you say?”

“
Nicholas!
Nicholas Marco. He’s dead. He’s
dead,
” Valerie said impatiently, as if it should mean something significant to Dallas.

Dallas was not fully awake. She leaned forward to grab an ecru knit afghan from a basket on the floor next to the sofa and attempted to spread it over herself. She wished she’d taken time to put on a robe. She felt a chill as goose bumps rose on her limbs. Her mind began leafing through a mental file, a chronology of childhood events, of incidents and occasions between herself and Nicholas Marco. The list was short and select. She’d actively tried to stay out of his way.

Still, there had been times, like that Tuesday afternoon, when the details remained crystal clear. Even then what most often came to mind had less to do with Nicholas and the attempted rape than with the other person so fatefully present that day.

Alex. He’d appeared out of nowhere to save her.

So, Nicholas Marco was dead.

For Dallas the announcement resurrected deep-seated feelings. Sympathy wasn’t one of them. Vin must be beside himself, she speculated silently. And poor Lillian …

“When did it happen? How?” Dallas asked, feeling neither shock nor sorrow.

“Sometime last night, I think. I got a call from Mom. She heard from Sylvia Campbell. You remember her? That retired schoolteacher whose house is behind the Marcos’. She saw a cop car come to the house around ten o’clock. She told my mother she could hear Lillian screaming …”

Dallas squeezed her eyes tightly closed, and felt a strong wave of sympathy for the woman. “Bad news spreads quickly,” she murmured.

“That’s what happens in a neighborhood when everyone knows everyone else’s business. I swear if I ever commit a crime, five people on the block will know about it before I’m booked.”

“So how did he die? Was Nicholas sick or something?” There was a pause and then more quiet tears. Dallas was starting to lose patience with Val. She didn’t understand all this weeping over Nicholas Marco.

“No …” Valerie croaked. “He … he was out at some party and got tanked. Then he insisted he could drive home. You know how Nicholas was. Always trying to show how macho he was. Can you believe he’d be so stupid?”

“Yes,” Dallas responded flatly, although she doubted Valerie had heard or was even actually expecting an answer.

“He was with someone. Not his wife, of course. Or should I say his almost ex-wife. Some bimbo. Mom said she walked away with whiplash and a few broken nails. Can you believe that? She had her seat belt on.”

“Then she wasn’t a bimbo,” Dallas said dryly.

“Forget her,” Valerie said, annoyed. “What about Nicholas, for Christ’s sake? We grew up with him.”

“We lived in the same community,” Dallas corrected. “Other than that I had nothing in common with Nicholas Marco. He didn’t like black people.”

“I don’t know if I believe that.”

“How could you forget the stuff that went on the year my family moved into the neighborhood, Val? The racial slurs spray-painted on our garage door? Remember your folks taking Dean and me in for a week so my parents didn’t have to worry about us while the police investigated? We heard talk that Nicholas and his friends were involved.”

“No one ever saw him do anything. Anyway, it was just talk. He was a kid.”

“Old enough to be dangerous. And I was …” Dallas stopped abruptly.

Valerie made an impatient sound through the phone. “Don’t tell me you were scared of him. He acted tough, but he really wasn’t.”

“How do you know that?”

“Look, it doesn’t matter anymore. Your family was like everyone else in the neighborhood.”

No, we weren’t,
Dallas thought stubbornly. She knew there was no way that Valerie could understand the effects of the reign of terror her family had gone through for those first months. The past was even more complicated than that because no one knew about what she alone had to endure. She got it from both sides, like working double duty: for being black … and not being black enough. As if it were her fault that her mother was white.

Dallas suddenly realized that her body was tense. She was a little surprised that she still harbored an intense dislike of Nicholas. It had been years since she had seen him, years since he had even remotely been a threat to her, and now he no longer existed. But that didn’t offer much relief. There was always going to be someone like him. Different people … same issues. There was a lot Valerie didn’t know or understand.

Valerie blew her nose. Dallas grimaced and shook her head. “I don’t understand what you’re carrying on about. You never had much good to say about Nicholas, either.”

“He wasn’t so bad.”

“You’re only saying that because he’s dead.”

“Dallas, don’t be that way. He was kinda cute. I thought he was funny …”

“He was a jerk.”

“You don’t understand,” Valerie said, no longer crying but her voice still husky with emotion.

“No, I don’t.”

“We used to tease each other. You know. He’d try to come on to me and say things like, is your father sober this week. And I’d tell him he smelled like garlic. He’d say, for someone Irish I was pretty. And I’d say, for someone Italian he was smart.”

“Which one of you was telling the truth?”

Valerie reluctantly laughed.

It did no good, Dallas realized, to attack the dubious character of Nicholas Marco. Maybe it was easier for Valerie to remember Nicholas more fondly because they were both white.

“There’s going to be a wake Friday night. What time can you get out here?” Valerie asked.

“What?”

“There’s probably going to be two viewing times. I’d rather go to the early one. More people will be there.”

“I’m not going.”

“What do you mean, you’re not going?”

“I mean, I’m not going. I don’t want to be there.”

“Come on, Dallas. You can’t
not
be there. It’ll look strange. Everyone will notice.”

“And no one will care. Especially not Nicholas’s family.”

“I don’t want to go alone. I can’t just walk in there, look at him laid out all stiff and everything, and … and not …” Valerie’s voice quavered.

“Valerie, look … it’s obvious that Nicholas’s death has really shaken you up. I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had that much feeling for him.”

“It’s just that Nicholas was always there, you know? He was part of our lives, good or bad.”

“Well, I think the best way for me to respect his memory is to stay away.”

“Look, everyone knows you’re friendly with Lillian. If you don’t come, people are going to wonder why. You don’t have to stay long, just please come.” Valerie’s urging ended on a plaintive note.

Dallas knew Valerie was attempting to manipulate the situation. But of course, she knew she had to go. Lillian was her friend, and she cared about what she might be going through. Lillian deserved the respect accorded her as a grieving mother.

“All right … I’ll come …”

“Good.”

“Just don’t expect me to cry and say anything, Valerie.”

“I won’t, but you’ll feel different once you’re there. Are you going to take the train back into the city or stay over?”

“I don’t know. Depends on how late this is going to last.”

“Why don’t you stay with me?”

Dallas chuckled. “Not if you’re going to spend the night wailing about Nicholas Marco.”

When Dallas got off the phone, it was almost three a.m. but she was not inclined to go back to sleep. She felt strangely wired. Not the kind that comes from shock or bad news, but the kind born of speculation. She hardly ever went back to the old neighborhood anymore. Despite having been raised there for some fifteen years, it was not a place she remembered with fondness.

Dallas stretched out completely on the sofa and wrapped herself thoroughly in the afghan. It would have made more sense to return to the bedroom, but she couldn’t. She listened to the silence of her apartment, letting both a sense of disquiet and pensive reflections engulf her. No matter how far she tried to get away from the past, she was irrevocably tied to it. Everything from the past was the foundation for who she was in her life, even in that very moment.

Dallas remembered vividly that she had been six years old the first time anyone ever called her a nigger. Nicholas Marco had been the one. She understood the power of the slur in the way it had been said, and the way it made her feel. Very small. Almost invisible. It put her in her place, and made Nicholas feel strong and righteous.

Dallas sighed. She hadn’t supposed that her family moving into North Lakewood, a predominately white middle-class neighborhood on the southern shore of Long Island, was going to mean being scared all the time. There were people there who hated them.

She remembered her father sitting at the window all night staring out into the dark street. It made no sense when they returned home from shopping one Saturday to find that every single window in their house had been broken. Dallas didn’t understand why anyone would put sugar in her father’s gas tank or set fire to their garbage. But she remembered the names of certain people being whispered, Nicholas Marco among them. Dallas recalled her father’s stern warning to stay away from the Marco house. She could still hear the way her father had answered in frustration and anger when she’d asked why.