The Undertaker (34 page)

“No, no, I love photography. Black and white. Never color.”

“Why do you think I work at that art gallery? You think I like that old fart Fantozzi chasing me around the storeroom. The kids pictures? The Polish weddings?” I've been taking classes at the Art Institute, working on my own show,” she said, still coming at me. “Le Magnifique and all that other crap pays my tuition.”

“I was only teasing,” I said, backing up until she had me trapped against the billboard.

She broke up giggling. “That was way too easy,” she said as she pressed in against me. “Gino was right, you really are a wuss.”

“There's a reason why men hate women, you know.”

“It isn't fair, is it?” she said with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “And now I've got you right where I want you.” She put her arms around me, her small, hard breasts pressing into my stomach. One could argue that it was just “one of those things” — two bodies at the same place at the same time. Most guys wouldn't complain or even comment, but this wasn't “one of those things.” She knew exactly what she was doing and I didn't dare say a word. That would only make things worse. I could have turned or pulled away, but she had me backed up to the billboard, so I couldn't do that either. I didn't want to. And I couldn't kid myself that I didn't like it, because I did.

Her head only came up to my chest. I looked down and saw those jet black eyes locked on mine. Neither of us said anything, but almost imperceptibly she shifted her body and her breasts moved ever so lightly across me. I closed my eyes. That was one of the most incredibly erotic feelings I had ever experienced.

“Please don't.” I leaned forward and whispered into the top of her head. I could tell she was about to say something, so I laid a gentle finger across her lips. “Please don't,” I repeated, thinking how wonderful her hair smelled. “And don't say anything. Please.”

She could tell from my expression that I wasn't playing anymore, so she backed away. She started to say something, but she stopped and looked confused and deeply embarrassed. I could see she was about to cry. “It's your wife again, Terri, isn't it?” she whispered as she pressed her face into my chest and began to blubber. “Peter, I didn't mean anything. No, that's a big lie. I
did
mean something. I meant a lot! But I was only being playful, flirting, trying to make you feel good. Now I feel so horrible, because the last thing in the world I want is to hurt you.” She buried her face in my chest and started to sob. “I can do that Peter, make you feel good and help you, if you'll let me.”

I tipped her head up and pressed my finger against her lips again. “It's okay. We can talk about it later, I just can't talk about it now, okay?” I knew this was going to happen some day. It had to, and I knew I would be no more prepared for it then than I was the day Terri died. Maybe I would never be. Looking down at Sandy, I knew the choice was going to be made for me, and I had better figure out how to deal with it.

Mercifully, I saw the headlights of two silver, electric railroad cars bouncing down the tracks toward us. “Let's get out of here,” I whispered. She pulled away as the train stopped next to us and we quickly got aboard. The car was about half full, but we were able to find an empty seat near the back. Sandy sat down a few inches away from me, stiff and wooden. Seconds later, the train pulled out and quickly picked up speed. I looked out the window. There wasn't a single cloud in the high, blue sky, but I knew Terri was up there somewhere watching all of this. I was still hopelessly in love with her, but I knew I was quickly falling in love with Sandy at the same time. But she had me tied in knots so bad, I couldn't even talk to her about it.

Out of totally lame desperation, I put my arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer. “You didn't do anything wrong, Sandy. I'm just damaged goods and you're going to have to give me some time and space to work it out, okay?”

“Damaged goods?
You?
” she looked up at me in disbelief “I had a husband go gay on me. He gets shot to death by his boyfriend. I'm a not-so-recovering alcoholic who goes to AA meetings three or four times a week, and I haven't had a guy even want to leave my toilet seat up for two years. And you think
you're
damaged goods?”

“Sandy, look…”

“No, no, I swear I'll behave, just don't be mad at me, Peter. I don't think I could take that.” She leaned her head against my chest and we sat like that without talking for a long time, longer than I could imagine her staying quiet. “You know,” she finally said. “In Michigan City, I remember there's a big commuter parking lot near the station, one of those self-park things.”

“And?”

“And we can get off there, well short of South Bend, boost a car, and head east. In a commuter lot like that, it could be a long time before a car would ever be missed.”

“Is “boosting” cars something else from your wayward youth?”

“Seventh Grade at Infant Jesus of Prague,” she said, then looked up at me. “It's a Catholic girls school on the North side… Really.

“Really?” I looked at her, convinced she had to be making this up as she went along.

“I'm serious. Bobby McNally taught me a lot of things and boosting cars was one of them. By junior year of high school, he was running a car-parts-to-order business from the back of the cafeteria. If you needed a transmission for a '95 Olds. A carburetor for a new BMW. Maybe custom chrome hubcaps, bucket seats, the whole engine. Bobby's little band of elves would have it for you the next morning. Half the body shops on the south side were calling him.”

“And you were one of his elves, I suppose?”

“Let me put it this way. You keep doing all the deep thinking and I'll handle the little details like getting us there.”

I leaned back in the seat and the rocking of the car and the rhythmic rattle of the steel wheels on the rails proved too much. With her head on my chest and a drowsy afternoon sun washing in through the window, sweet girl smells slowly wrapped themselves around me and I fell asleep. The next thing I felt was Sandy's soft fingers on my cheek. “Wake up. We're getting near Michigan City and I don't want you to be a zombie when we get there.” I sat up and looked out the window, as we passed the first sign for Michigan City and the train began to slow. As the train pulled into the station, I saw the large, fenced commuter lot she mentioned, sitting across the street from the train station.

“It's got a guard,” I pointed down at the booth and the gate across the exit.

“A parking lot attendant?” she scoffed. “Piece of cake.”

We walked down the long flight of concrete stairs, across the street, and past the guard as if we belonged there. She was right. He was at least sixty, fat and gray, studying the centerfold in
Hunter's Digest
with a stub of a cigar clenched between his teeth.

“A retired postal worker,” Sandy walked me to the rear of the lot and held out her arms like a used car salesman surveying her empire. “What's your preference today, Mister Talbott? Feel a little racy?” She wiggled her eyebrows. “No? That Volvo's got your name on it. Or, maybe that lovely Toyota Corolla.” She pulled me farther away from the gate. “I've got it. That dusty, dark-green Chevrolet two rows back that looks like it hasn't moved for a couple of days That's the one for us.”

As we walked over, I saw she was right about the dust.

“It's less obvious than the imports, ” she went on. “And I won't need a computer to get into the ignition. Besides, the button on the passenger door is up, which means it isn't even locked. Here, hold out your hand.” She opened her bag, dug to the bottom, pulled out a quarter, and dropped it in my palm. “Pretend it's a screw driver. While I play with the ignition, you switch the rear plate with the one on that Firebird in the next row. It'll give us a little edge.”

“More Bobby McNally?”

“Him, or an Elmore Leonard novel, or maybe it was an old MacGyver, I can't remember which. Anyway, get moving.”

“Yes, ma'am, but what about the front plate?”

“I'll do it after I get the engine started.”

“You think I can't do them both by myself?”

She looked at me again as if I was a third-grader. Sure enough, before I had the rear plate even halfway off the Chevrolet, she had the engine running, the front plate changed, and was standing over me with another dose of humiliation. Looking down at my limited progress, she pulled a large key ring from her purse. “Men,” I heard her mutter. The key ring had enough gadgets dangling from it to overhaul a tank and she quickly had the rear license plate off the Firebird. She came over, knelt next to me, and used her tool on the last screw on the Chevrolet.

“Well, it was rusty,” I argued. “And I didn't have one of those Swiss Army tool kits like you've got.” I pointed toward her key ring.

“No whining, Talbott.” she said as she screwed the Firebird's license plate into place. “I'll give you a cookie later, now get in. I'll drive,” she said. When I looked at her and frowned, she quickly added, “After what you did to that poor Lincoln, don't you
dare
look at me like that. Besides, I can get us past that Bozo and out of here, and all you'll accomplish is to get us thrown in jail.”

Before she put the car in gear, she reached behind her back, unfastened her bra, did some contortions inside her lime-green top, and pulled the bra out the neck opening. She pulled on the collar and stretched even more. “Relax. This show isn't for you,” she said as she put the car in gear and drove down the long aisle to the exit. When she stopped next to the ticket booth, she leaned forward and looked up at the attendant so he could see right down the neck opening at her breasts.

“Hey,” she smiled helplessly up at him. “I've looked everywhere, but I can't find that damned ticket,”

“Sorry, Miss,” he said, looking down, gawking. “Uh, it's a two-day minimum.” He tapped the sign under the window. “That's thirty bucks.”

“Thirty bucks! That's a rip, man,” she said as she fumbled in her purse and reluctantly handed over the money.

“Sure is, but better you get ripped than me. If I give a ticket out, I gotta turn one in or they take the thirty bucks out of my pay. But you have a nice day now, you hear.”

We drove out on the street and turned right. “It ain't what you got, Talbott, it's knowing how to use it.”

“I suppose you learned that at “Infant Jesus of Prague too?”

“No, tenth grade at Pius the 12th, Sister Mary Boniface, English Lit.”

I turned and looked at her. “All you did was flash the guy.”

“Some people just don't understand art.” She shook her head with a wistful smile. “The guard would remember you, but when I stopped, he never looked at my face, the car, you, or anything else. You may not appreciate them, but he sure did.”

I smiled and looked at my watch. It was almost 2:00. “Let's find the signs for I-80,” I told her as I opened the glove compartment. I pawed through the trash inside. At the bottom, I found a couple of battered road maps and pulled them out.

We had reached an empty stretch of road and she pulled over to the curb. “Turn around,” she told me. I started to turn toward her only to get a slap on the shoulder. “The other way, you moron! I want to put my bra back on.” I turned away as she pulled the lime green top up over her head. “And don't you dare watch me in the window glass, or I'll slap you silly.” She stopped to untangle the bra before she put it back on and I smiled as I watched her in the window glass, then turned my eyes to the Michigan road map. She slapped me on the back. “You turkey! You were watching. I saw that!”

“I was controlling myself just fine until you told me not to look.”

“Talbott, you have more self control in your little finger than all the other guys I've ever met put together,” she said as she pulled the top back over her head. “So suffer!”

The Michigan road map showed the northern tier of Ohio, too. On the back, I found a table with mileage between US cities. “It's nine hundred miles to Boston.”

“There's always Washington DC. We need to call Timmy Hardin tomorrow. We could go there.”

“Maybe, but Boston first.”

Up ahead we saw the first sign for I-80. Sandy pointed. “Isn't the toll road the first place they'll look if they think we're heading east?”

I looked fondly at the sign, but she was right.

“It's going to take us all night to get that far anyway,” she said. “And that's too many hours in a stolen car.”

“Yeah, I know.” I reached in my pocket and pulled out the Amtrak brochures. “There's a train from Chicago to Boston.” I looked at the schedule. “We can catch it in Toledo. No one would be looking for us there.”

“Toledo? You got that right. And the train? Sneaky.”

“It doesn't leave there until 1:30 in the morning and it doesn't get to Boston until 6:30 tomorrow evening.”

“Not exactly like flying, is it?”

“No, but slow and meandering might keep us under Tinkerton's radar.”

“It won't take us six hours to get to Toledo, so we have a lot of time to kill.”

“We'll take the back roads,” I said as I looked down at the map. “You drive for a while and I'll navigate.”

“Sounds like a plan,” she said as she reached for the radio. “Just one little problem, I can't go six hours without a big dose of Merle Haggard.”

I wanted to gag, but I didn't want another bruise so I let it go.