Hush (35 page)

herself up and never see or hear anything again. If she could have climbed into

life's womb, she would have done so and never looked back. She was starting to

go numb.
Boyce's features disappeared, and his hand came through the hole and reached for

the handle, stretching and straining and gaining inches with his efforts. His

fingers were almost upon it when she saw the veins in his arm and remembered how

the serious suicides did it: they sliced themselves open the long way. They were

usually the older kids who had been shuffled from one foster home to another,

the thirteen and fourteen-year-olds who were already homeless, who found a flop

for a week or two before they were forced to move on— the children who wanted no

part of life and were trying to end it as quickly as they could.
She ripped open the cabinet door right below the sink and searched frantically

for the razor blade they'd used to scrape paint off the bathroom window just two

weeks ago. She found it lying off to the side and picked it up carefully.
She studied Boyce's arm. It looked like sculpted stone with ropy veins that rose

like ridge lines on a topographical map.
She held out the razor nervously. She was standing close to him but not close

enough. Come on, she urged herself, do it. Do it. Do it before he kills you. Do

it before he does it to you.
She trained her eyes on a big purple vein that ran along the outer part of his

forearm. That's where she would start the cut— close to his wrist— and where she

would end it— down by his elbow. She would open him up with one long slice, and

then hack his arm as he pulled it away.
She stepped over Pluto's body and moved within inches of Boyce's hand. She

lifted the razor, swallowed, and almost choked on her dry throat. It felt as if

she'd inhaled a corn husk, and as she worked her mouth to try to find some

moisture his arm suddenly straightened and his hand brushed her gown. He

immediately lunged for her, and she jumped back and slipped on the bloody tile,

dropping the razor as she reached for the edge of the vanity to keep from

falling. He quickly withdrew his arm and kicked the door again, widening the

hole. She backed up all the way to the tub and stepped into it as his arm snaked

through the opening. Her feet burned, and she saw her red footprints on the

floor, the yellow water too. The tub felt slippery, and the blood looked

especially bright on the shiny white surface.
She raised the window shade and looked at the latch, the same one she'd fastened

hours earlier.
He's coming in. I've got to get out.
Her thoughts were that simple. She looked back at the door and saw that his hand

had disappeared.
Bam!
Now the hole was huge, the size of a dog door.
Jesus, can he get through that? Celia tore at the latch but failed to open it.
"Where...do...you...think...you're...going?" The same words he'd used with her

cat, but slower this time, and grim, like her mother when she was angry. He

peered through the hole, and she could see his entire face, no longer handsome

but horrifying. His dark eyes held her as he started to laugh.
He's crazy, she thought. Out of his fucking mind.
But Celia was swirling around her own form of madness, the prairie fire of fear

that filled her with terror for she now knew her greatest nightmare: not that he

would kill her but that he would drive her insane. Already she sensed a hard

truth: a mean understanding of mutilation as the underbelly of everything.
She wept over this and fought to see the world as it really was, and she

succeeded at this intimidating task, though her only reward was reality and this

proved terrifying too: his eyes, the hole in the door, the broken bloody mirror,

her cat crumpled like an old rug, the red streaks on the tile, the yellowish

puddle, and the razor blade she had dropped.
"Hey, what's that?" He had spotted the razor and pointed to it. "Were you going

to cut me?" Chet stared at it. He remembered how his arm had been hanging out

there with no protection, none. And she was going to cut me. Fair is fair,

she'll find out.
He reached down and twirled it around his fingers as a magician will a coin,

sliding it over his knuckles until it felt as smooth as oil. He paused only

briefly to test the sparkle of its edge, and then resumed the rolling motion as

he talked.
"I'm going to have to cut you up, you know that, right? I mean, fair is fair."
Celia didn't say a word. She watched the way he kept moving the razor around. It

was a mean trick. He stopped suddenly and held it pinched between his thumb and

index finger, like a tiny tomahawk, with that single sharp vertical edge facing

her.
"I'm going to scalp you." He laughed. "What do you think of that?"
Celia kept her silence.
"I don't hear you saying anything now, Mrs. Griswold, but I'll bet you had

plenty to say about Davy's pictures, didn't you? You thought you had it all

figured out, didn't you?"
She could not hide the tremor in her voice: "You do things to him, you touch

him, don't you?" She nodded heavily, almost uncontrollably, and noticed that her

whole body was shaking terribly.
"I don't do anything the boy doesn't like."
"You're a liar!" she screamed, and her fists pounded the air in front of her.

"You lie to him, to me, you lie to yourself."
Chet's voice never changed pitch, never grew angry. "I'm going to make you a

promise right now, Mrs. Griswold. You want to know what that promise is?"
She stared at his hand as he continued to toy with the razor.
"I promise that you'll never see the light of day, and that by the time I'm

through with you, you won't want to. Now that's a promise, Mrs. Griswold...and I

always keep my promises."
His hand moved quickly to the door knob. His kicks had enlarged the hole, and

now he had no trouble reaching the handle. Desperately, she tried to open the

window latch. Her hands shook badly and slipped, and her shoulder fell against

the glass. She looked back and saw him turning the knob. She wasn't going to

make it. There's a point in most murders when the victims know it's over, when

they understand that they can continue to struggle but they can't continue to

survive. This was Celia's moment. She knew he was coming in, and when the door

lock sprang open she no longer had any possible doubt.
She stabbed at the window latch convulsively with the heel of her hand, but with

no real hope of escape. It surprised her when it gave way. In a single frenzied

moment she slid the window up, punched out the screen, and hoisted herself onto

the sill. She heard sounds a few feet behind her— the sweep of broken glass, her

dead cat kicked out of the way— as she hurled herself headfirst toward the deck.
He might have grabbed her foot as she fell out the window, she couldn't be sure.

She rolled across the redwood and fell to the ground. Nausea flooded her entire

body as she hoisted herself up and raced madly down the driveway on unstable

legs. Crunching sounds from the gravel shadowed her every step, and at any

moment she expected him to drag her down from behind; but the noises came from

her own bloodied feet. She realized this only after she'd run halfway to the

county road and stopped. She had to. She could no longer choke down the vomit

surging through her system. She spilled her stomach onto the dry vegetation and

tried mightily not to gag. As she leaned over, drool dripping from her lips, she

saw the lights in the living room go on. Her hand shook as she wiped her mouth,

and so did the branch when she moved it aside for a better look. Boyce's head

passed by the kitchen window; he appeared to be searching for something.
She noticed again how badly her legs shook. The soles of her feet had been

tortured by the glass and now by the gravel. A sharp pain throbbed in her right

heel, and she held it up in the moonlight to examine it closely. A bloody sliver

of glass protruded from the very back, and she eased out the two-inch length

slowly, suffering the sharp pain in silence. She knew she couldn't run any

farther. The wounds in her feet she might be able to bear, but the agony in her

knee only worsened as she stood there.
She spotted the flashlight beam as he opened the front door. It moved back and

forth, and she figured he'd found the one they kept on the kitchen counter. He

didn't seem to know which way she'd fled, and she tried hard to quiet her heavy

breathing.
Chet couldn't see her, but this didn't bother him as much as smashing his head

against the window frame when he'd tried to grab her goddamn foot. He'd slipped

on the floor— fucking blood— and he figured that little miscue had cost him at

least half a pint. She'd got his hand and now his goddamn head. He wiped his

brow and saw that he was still bleeding. That's the way it was with head wounds,

they bled a lot. He knew about these things. Bashing himself like that had also

cost him a few precious seconds, and then he'd made another mistake by not

watching to see exactly which way she ran. It was just like the fuckup he'd made

when she was out walking around in the goddamn woods. He was taking too much for

granted, and he cursed himself roundly. But he'd found her quick enough then,

and he figured to do the same thing again. He knew for a fact that she didn't

have a prayer, not out there, not by herself.
"Time, time, time is on my side ..."
He moved the flashlight back and forth and followed the beam carefully. He saw

lots of trees and lots of scrub. That's okay, he told himself, because sooner or

later I'll see her. Don't worry, Mrs. Griswold. I'm coming. You can't hide

forever.
"Time, time, time, is on my side, yes it is ..."
51
Jack roared down the highway at ninety miles an hour. He glanced at the

speedometer and pressed even harder on the accelerator. Straight stretch, no

problem. Besides, he reassured himself, the moon's got the whole world lit up

like a power plant.
He'd scanned the radio for company, but the only station he'd found— other than

Bentman's KLOG, never an option— was playing a Saturday night "oldies" show. He

loathed them, but he listened. He loathed them because certain songs could play

in his head for days, like the ditty he'd just heard:
"B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O, and Bingo was his name-O!"
But he listened because even the most insipid songs could bring back memories of

his youth that even a young lover could not compete with.
Then there were the songs that left him empty with ache, that he could barely

endure but never turned off, like "Heart and Soul." Every time he heard it he

remembered his sister as a gangly eleven-year-old plinking out the notes on an

old upright piano. She passed away three years ago from breast cancer, and Jack

still mourned the loss.
Other songs made him think of Celia, the early years, and he longed for those

times too, before he started cheating on her. The marriage had never been the

same after that, not for him. He'd wanted it to be, but it never was. You can't

reclaim the virginity of your passion. He'd read that in a self-help book back

in Chicago and had been condemned to remember it always.
He snapped out of his sad reveries when he heard that a "big hit" by Burt

Bacharach was coming up. He'd always liked his music, especially the one that

goes, "Raindrops keep falling on my head ..."
But first there was a commercial for chewing gum, then another for shampoo. And

another...and another. He leaned back, saw that he'd topped ninety-five, and

looked for the turnoff for Bentman. Any minute now. He would hug Celia as soon

as he walked in the door, no matter how late it was, and he would love her as he

never had before. They would have children, a family, a life. He could not amend

the past but they could have a new beginning.
He glanced once more at the dash and saw that he was approaching one hundred.

Better slow down. But something else caught his eye, and he looked back at his

left hand, which held the steering wheel, and saw that his wedding ring was

missing.
"Goddamn it!" He pounded the wheel so hard it vibrated. After picking up the

ring at the office on the way out of town, he'd left it behind at the Bear Haus.

Jesus! He eased up on the gas and debated whether to go back. The turnoff for

Bentman appeared up ahead on his right. He really wanted everything to be

perfect with Celia, and she would notice the missing ring. She sure did last

night. And then he'd have to lie again. He was sick of lying to her.
He could always go back and get it. It wasn't as if she was expecting him to

walk in the door anytime soon. But another hour and a half of driving? In the

middle of the night? The pickup slowed to fifty-five as he tried to decide:

Home...or back to Helen?
52
Celia was still shaking as she ducked behind the young fir trees that lined the

driveway. She watched the monster on the deck as all prey watch the creatures

that stalk them, and slowly understood that more than their respective positions

had changed: In the bathroom she had been trapped like an animal, now she would

be hunted like one.
But long ago she'd learned about hate, how to keep more than an arm's reach away

from its grip. She'd spent years skulking around her mother's house, slipping

into corners, closets, slipping out, listening intently for her mother's

footsteps on the stairs, on the carpet, and learning to read their mood as one