Ribbons (24 page)

34

Matt watched Amber as she stripped off her bra for one of the customers. He wasn’t trying to be a perv; he was just looking for a chance to ask her a question. Her customer was an older man who had those cool white streaks in his hair along his temples. That and the goatee made him look like he could be a Bond villain, especially if he had a cool accent. Matt hadn’t heard him speak yet, though.

The man was sitting in an armchair in the parlor. He had Amber all to himself. The only other customers were being served shots by a naughty cheerleader at the bar. The man held up a twenty-dollar bill and raised an eyebrow. Amber raised an eyebrow of her own and leaned toward him. She used her hands to squeeze her breasts together around the bill. Then she straddled his lap and pressed herself against him while she made a little moan into his ear. Matt took that opportunity to come up behind the chair and ask his question.

He tried to just mouth the words, exaggerating each one and using vague hand gestures.
Have you seen Christy?

That seemed to work because she straightened up and said, “Yeah, she was looking for you, actually. She’s probably in the break room with Adam.” She used her regular speaking voice, which made Matt feel like he was being a dork.

“Okay, thanks,” said Matt. The gentleman underneath Amber turned his head to look at him. Matt took a step back. “Oh, sorry.”

“This is Sam,” said Amber. “He’s been around awhile.”

“Don’t mind me,” said Sam. “I’m just here for the show.”

Matt was a little disappointed that he didn’t have a British accent, or at least a German one.

Amber swung a leg around so that she was sitting in Sam’s lap instead of straddling it. “She brought you a burger. And a
shake
.”

Apparently, this was turning into a conversation.

“That was nice of her,” said Matt.

Amber traced one finger along Sam’s shirt collar. “You know what that means don’t you?”

“She’s trying to give me diabetes?” asked Matt.

“It means she was thinking about you,” said Amber.

Matt waved it off. “It’s just a shake.”

Sam tilted his head and looked at him like he was a child. “It’s never just a shake.”

“Sorry?” asked Matt.

“A burger? Maybe that’s just a kind gesture,” said Sam. “Picking up dinner for the boss to put him in a good mood. But she bought you a shake. A
shake
. She had to think about what kind of man you are. Vanilla? Chocolate? Strawberry? That choice says a lot about your character. And a lot about what she thinks of you.”

Matt gave Amber a sideways glace. “Does it?”

Amber nodded like it was obvious.

Sam continued his lecture. “Hell yeah, it does. What’s your favorite?”

“I don’t know,” said Matt. “Vanilla?”

“Is that a question?” asked Sam.

“I mean, I guess it’s vanilla,” said Matt. “I’ve never really thought much about it. I don’t think I ever get strawberry.”

“That’s sad,” said Sam. “That tells me you’ve lost touch with your childhood.”

Amber nodded again. “I like strawberry,” she said.

Matt shrugged. “I don’t know. I do goof off a lot. People say I’m childish.”

“Being a child’s not about goofing off,” said Sam. “It’s about exploring new things. Being a teenager is about goofing off.”

“Oh,” said Matt. “What’s your favorite?”

“Are you kidding? I can’t drink that shit,” said Sam. “They don’t even use real ice cream anymore.”

“They don’t?” asked Matt.

“You just pay attention to what kind of shake she got you,” said Sam. “Is it the same as hers? Does she think you’re alike? Maybe she got you chocolate. She might think there’s a little mystery to you. Just watch out if she got you Neapolitan.”

Amber was trying to be helpful. “That’s when they put all three together.”

Sam continued. “Then she doesn’t know what to think of you. She’s hedging her bets.”

This guy knew a little too much about fast-food and the human psyche. Maybe he
was
a supervillain.

Matt suddenly felt a rush of paranoia. “You’re not a ventriloquist, are you?”

“Uh, no.”

“Good.”

Matt left them to their armchair romance. Amber went back to work, this time spinning around and teasing the waistband of her panties. Matt thought it was a little bit creepy that Sam kept watching him instead of Amber as he left the parlor.

Christy wasn’t in the break room. There was a new crow staring at him from the table, though. Maybe she saw that and decided to eat out in the clubhouse. Matt wouldn’t want to eat in here, either. He wondered where Thug Guy was.

Matt turned down the hallway toward the back door. The lights in the hallway were dim and the red light above the VIP room door seemed to drain the color out of everything. Even so, he could see a bunch of trash scattered around on the floor below the red bulb. When he was a few steps away, he realized what it was.

He tapped on the door to the VIP room with one knuckle. “Hello?”

Christy answered. Her voice was faint like she was busy doing something. “I’m . . . I’m with somebody.”

“Are you okay?” asked Matt. “It looks like the Burger King just threw up all over the floor out here.”

“Sorry,” she said. “Wasn’t me. I’m just covering for Erica. One of her regulars stopped by. Let
Dwayne
know I’ll have to reschedule his session.”

Wait. What? None of that made any sense.
She
was the one picking up burgers today. She never covered for Erica. Nobody covered for Erica, because Erica wouldn’t let them. And Christy would never have a
session
with Dwayne. This was crazy talk.

Then he noticed another pool of liquid starting to seep out under the door. This pool didn’t look like milkshake. It was dark and syrupy. It also didn’t come from any of the paper cups lying on the ground. Matt bent down and touched his finger to it. He held it up to his nose. It didn’t smell sweet. It smelled metallic. He knew that smell.

He cleared his throat to try to keep the shaking out of his voice. “Okay. I’ll let Dwayne know.”

His mind raced in a hundred different directions. Adrenaline mixed with sweat as the questions started clamoring in his head. Whose blood was that? Who was in there with her? Why didn’t she ask for help? Could this be a joke? Could this be a dream? What the hell should he do? Then his feet seemed to move on autopilot. They walked calmly and deliberately down the hall, then up the stairs, and into the office. When he sat down behind the desk he had to concentrate on breathing for a few seconds before he could do anything else.

He flipped open the lid to the cigar box on the desk. Uncle Quent’s gun felt heavy as he gripped the handle. He held it up in front of his face. The simple weapon suddenly seemed impossibly complex. He pulled and twisted different parts until the cylinder suddenly clicked out to one side. It was empty.

He grabbed the phone and dialed three digits.

“Pick up. Pick up. Pick up. Pick up.”

The voice on the other end of the line seemed too far away to be of any help. “9-1-1, please state your emergency.”

Matt blurted it all out. “The guy! The killer guy! I think he’s here! He killed something! There’s blood! He has Christy!”

“Is this a medical emergency? Is somebody injured?”

They weren’t getting it. Not fast enough.

“Sergeant Dwayne Murdock! Get him! Tell him Christy’s in trouble!”

“Are you calling from a safe location? Are you in immediate danger?”

“No. Yes. Also, I have a gun. But no bullets.” Matt looked inside the cigar box again. No bullets in there. “Where can I get some bullets?”

“The police department has been notified.”

If Uncle Quent had a gun, there had to be bullets somewhere. “Bullets . . .”

“Units are on their way.”

Matt grabbed the handle to the top draw of the desk. Pencils, pens, and ancient pink erasers jumped as he yanked it open. “Bullets . . .”

“Please try to remain calm.”

He opened another drawer. All of his new paperwork, but no bullets. “No. Not there . . .”

“Please stay on the line, sir.”

He opened up the bottom drawer. It looked empty, but he thought he heard something rattle when it slid open. “Where would I be if I was a bullet?”

The voice on the line was starting to lose its cool. “And please don’t do anything with that gun.”

Matt felt something hard and round hidden in the corner of the drawer. He held up the bullet in triumph.

“Found one!”

35

Adam stood with his back to the X-shaped thing in the center of the room. It looked like something you might tie somebody up to before you started torturing them. This whole room looked like a torture chamber. Adam didn’t get it. He knew people paid to come in here and be tied up. It had something to do with sex. But sex was supposed to make you feel good. He knew that much. He even knew what it looked like when people had sex. He figured he’d be nervous enough just kissing a girl. If one had a whip, he’d probably run away. Maybe that’s why they tied you up first.

“Here. Hold this.” The guy with the knife handed him a book.

Adam looked at it. It looked like a fairy tale book for kids. There was a big tree on the cover with a sleepy-looking owl perched up in the branches. The tree was in a garden full of flowers, fruits, and vegetables. A woman was smiling at a flower she had just planted. It looked a little bit like the woman Adam had seen earlier when the walls started vibrating.

“What is it?” he asked.

“It’s the thing you have to hold so I don’t hurt you,” said Foster.

Adam’s mom was on the leather bench in front of him. She was lying on her back, naked. She had one leg pressed over the other and her arms crossed over her breasts. The eye makeup she was wearing streaked back toward her ears. She wasn’t really crying, but every few seconds a tear would roll out from the corner of one of her eyes and trace a path to the floor. From this angle she had to tilt her head back to look at Adam.

“Honey, please just do what he says,” she said.

“Listen to your mother,” said Foster, who arranged the book so it was lying flat in Adam’s arms. Then he opened it up to a page in the middle. A scene sprang to life as pop-up paper trees and flowers lifted up from the pages. The tree that rose up from the center had a rope swing dangling from one of its branches. A woman in a white dress sat in the swing, and when the tree popped up into place, it set the swing in motion.

Foster looked at the book in Adam’s arms and held up his thumbs and pointer fingers like he was framing a picture. He nodded and turned back toward Adam’s mom.

As Foster walked away, Adam said, “I don’t think he really wants to hurt anybody.”

Foster paused halfway to the bench. He turned back to look at Adam and then pointed with his knife to the dead man on the ground. “That’s not true. I wanted to hurt
him
.”

Adam tried to keep his eyes on the floor, but he still had to say something. If he didn’t, Foster would just do what he’d come here to do.

“I guess so,” he said. “But the woman you speak to. The one in the garden. She’s the one who wants you to hurt these women.”

Foster continued to walk to the foot of the bench. “She doesn’t want to hurt them. She wants to help them. But she can’t, so she needs me.”

“She’s using you,” said Adam. “I told you. She only cares about what you can give her.”

Foster seemed to ignore that. He looked down at Adam’s mom and frowned. Then he gently pushed her leg to the side so that they were no longer crossed. He did the same with her arms. He didn’t stare at her breasts or even between her legs. He just kind of tilted his head from side to side like he was looking for something.

“Hmm . . .” Foster pulled a pen out of his back pocket. It was a big, fat, blue marker. He flicked the cap off with his thumb. The room almost immediately smelled like blueberries. He knelt beside the bench and leaned down to talk to Adam’s mom.

“Now don’t move,” he said. “If you move it might mess up the line. If that happens I’ll have to go find somebody else. But I would have to cut you both first. I can’t have you messing this up. I already messed up once today.”

Adam’s mom swallowed and gave a slight nod of her head. She was shaking a little.

“Here,” said Foster, “I’ll help you.”

Foster put down his pen and took her wrist. He bent it backward over her head where there was a strap waiting. She gripped a bar that looked like it was there just for that purpose, and Foster did up a buckle. He did the same with her other arm and then her ankles. Finally, he placed a strap with a rubber ball between her teeth and tightened it to the bench so her head couldn’t move much. More makeup mixed with tears.

Adam felt himself shaking. He could try to run.
He
wasn’t strapped to anything. But he probably wouldn’t make it very far. He would have to get past Foster to the door. Foster had locked the door and turned on the do-not-disturb light. This side of the door didn’t need a key—he would just have to turn the latch—but it would still slow him down. Adam didn’t want to leave his mom, though. If he ran, she would die.

Foster knelt down again, this time by one of her ankles. He picked up his pen and looked like he was about ready to start drawing on her. Then he paused and looked up at Adam.

“You’re wrong about her,” he said. “That woman you saw? She’s the only one who cares about me.”

When the pen touched her toe, Adam’s mom tightened her grip on the bar. She squeezed her eyes shut and let out a little sound around the ball in her mouth, but otherwise she didn’t move.

“How can you tell?” asked Adam.

Foster kept his eyes on the line he was drawing. “Trust me, nobody’s going to cry when I leave this place.”

“I mean, how can you tell that she actually does care about you?”

“She saved me. She could have let me die. Instead, she showed me her home. She invited me to come join her. She wants me there.”

“Why would she do that?” Adam asked. “She doesn’t even know you.”

“She’s like me,” said Foster. “She was rejected. By . . . by everybody who mattered. So she made a new home for herself. It’s beautiful. It’s a place where things live and grow. She needs people to help take care of it.”

From where he was standing, Adam couldn’t see all of the line Foster was drawing. He saw the line spiral around his mom’s ankle and then snake up her calf. Foster slowed down when he got to her thigh to make a pattern. It was a new one to Adam. More complex than the patterns he drew on the wall of the clubhouse. He thought he shouldn’t be watching this, not when his mom was naked, but his eyes kept getting pulled back to the line and the patterns.

“Are you sure any of this is real?” asked Adam.

“Of course it is,” said Foster. “You saw it, too, right? You walked the forest path.”

Adam’s eyes kept losing focus when he stared at the patterns for too long. There was also a faint buzzing in his head. That was a sign that he should take one of his pills.

“Yeah,” said Adam, “but I’m off my meds. I get tremors, and I say things that don’t make sense. It doesn’t mean I believe everything I see.”

“Maybe you should,” said Foster.

“I can see that my mom is scared. She doesn’t want this. Were the other women scared, too?”

“Everybody is afraid of change. We’re giving them a gift. They can start their lives over. Wash away all their regrets and bad decisions. Be with somebody who cares for them and gives them purpose. Once they get to the garden they aren’t afraid anymore.”

The buzzing got louder. Adam thought he could also hear birds chirping. The blueberry scent faded, and he smelled other things on a wispy breeze that almost wasn’t there—flowers, water, and warm earth. He thought Foster could smell it, too. He looked toward Adam and the book. Foster could obviously see something that Adam couldn’t. When Foster looked at it, he seemed nervous.

“You’re scared, too,” he said. “My mom never makes me feel afraid . . . on purpose.”

His mom tilted her head a little and tried to look at him. Her eyes were wet. She tried to mouth something, but it was hard to make out what it might be. He thought it was
I love you
.

Foster looked up at her. Her chest was heaving in silent sobs. He used his free hand to steady his other. “Stop crying. You’re gonna make me slip.”

“She tries to make the world seem less scary,” said Adam. “She wants to be with me.”

Foster rubbed his eyes and then continued drawing. “Does she?”

Adam’s own voice sounded like an echo. “She’s given up everything for me. She doesn’t ask me for anything.”

Now he could see what Foster was looking at. Roots lifted the dirt underneath Adam’s feet. He backed up a little and bumped into something rough. The large wooden cross was no longer behind him. Instead, a twisted tree trunk stretched up from the floor. Bark flaked off like dry, dead skin. Thick branches reached and spread out, hiding the ceiling. Hanging from one branch was a large swing the size of a love seat. The woman from the book was sitting in it. Next to her were two other women in white sundresses. They stared forward with milky-blue eyes.

She spoke to Foster. “Don’t listen to him. He has always been with his mother. He takes her for granted.”

Adam closed the book and turned to look at her. “No, I don’t. At least, I try not to. She’s all I’ve got.”

The Woman in the Garden looked at him first out of the corner of her eye, and then she turned her head to stare straight at him. If she was surprised to see Adam, it didn’t show. Foster
was
surprised. He stopped drawing, his line broken.

“Do you think her life is better for having you?” she asked Adam.

“I . . .” Adam wanted to say,
Yes, of course,
but he couldn’t.

The Woman in the Garden stood up from her swing. As she stepped onto the ground, paper flowers unfolded around her feet. The other women stayed where they were. An owl landed on the branch supporting the swing, fluttering down from somewhere above.

“A hug good night doesn’t make up for years of whoring yourself out. Do you really think this was her
plan
? That she wanted to live like this? She could have been anything she wanted, but she gave herself up for you.”

Adam’s voice cracked a little when he spoke. “I don’t think you can plan on loving someone. You just love them.”

“Enough,” she said. “This place isn’t for you. You don’t belong here.”

“Neither do they. Neither does he.”

“Leave,” she demanded. “Now.”

The owl screeched and flew at Adam. His vision went red as its talons squeezed around his eye.