Skinny Dip - Страница 58

His back was turned when she crumbled the small round tablet into his wineglass.

"Life is so unfair," she observed. "Why Joey, of all people?"

Chaz returned to the table and passed the shaker of grated cheese. Then he took another slug of merlot.

"Know what's weird?" Rose said. "The whole Madame Bovary thing. Joey never mentioned to any of us that she was reading it. The girls in the club, I mean. Why do you suppose not? We talk about everything we read."

"I can only guess." An errant noodle hung from the corner of Chaz's mouth. He slurped it expertly and continued. "Maybe because that particular book was too personal. Like I said in church, there might've been something heavy going on-depression, whatever-and Joey didn't want me or any of her friends to know."

"Chaz, tell me honestly. Do you think she killed herself?"

"No! I can't… I d-don't know," he said, affecting an agitated stammer. "I don't want to b-believe that. Like I said, this was a very happy girl most of the time."

Rose emphatically agreed. "She was. She truly was. That was a terrible question for me to ask-I'm so sorry, Chaz. Of course she didn't kill herself. Not Joey."

The subject was dropped, and they chatted pleasantly while they dined-music, movies, sports. It turned out that Rose was considering golf lessons.

She said, "I like any exercise where you don't hardly perspire. What's the matter, hon?"

Chaz grabbed the edge of the table. "I don't feel so good."

The room had started pitching and rolling like a carnival ride.

There seemed to be two Roses, each staring quizzically. In stereo they said, "You want to lie down? You should lie down."

"Good idea."

She led Chaz to her bedroom, sat him on the bed and tugged off his shoes.

"Here. Do as I say." She patted a stack of fluffy pillows. Chaz stretched out and closed his eyes. Christ, he thought, I haven't been this smashed in years.

"Be back in a minute," he heard Rose say before she turned out the lights.

Chaz smiled as he fumbled to unbuckle his pants. He beheld a delicious vision of Rose kicking off her jeans, peeling out of her tube top and sliding under the covers beside him. With some effort he scooted over to make more space in the bed.

Problem was, he really did not feel so great.

After a while he became aware of a motorized humming noise. Most likely it was the ceiling fan, but Chaz, cracking his eyelids, couldn't see much in the darkness. Amplified by an excess of alcohol, the fan's humming put Chaz in mind of a helicopter rotor, whirling perilously close to his bare head. He felt a cold prickle of dread and burrowed like a dung beetle under Rose's pillows. In his padded refuge he couldn't hear the jangle of her car keys, or the back door closing behind her.

After Rose drove away, Mick Stranahan turned to Joey.

"Ready?"

"It's now or never."

"Remember the rules."

"No punching. No kicking. No sharp instruments. What else?" Joey said.

"No tears."

"Are you kidding?" she said, and together they entered the house. Joey paused outside the bedroom to dab Chanel behind her ears.

Stranahan whispered, "I'll be right here if you need me."

She went inside, quietly closing the door behind her. There was a slight rustling in the dark, then a muffled voice from the bedcovers: "Rose?"

Joey sat on the corner of the bed.

"Rosie, honey. Come here," Chaz said.

Joey lay down rigidly beside her husband. He nosed his way out of the pillows and blindly beached his head on her right shoulder.

"You smell terrific. That perfume you're wearing, it's my favorite."

"Hmmm," Joey said. Chaz reeked of alcohol and garlic. She felt something blunt and familiar nudging her thigh, and thought: This is what they mean by the term dickbrain.

Chaz said, "I might be drunk."

Stoned, too, mused Joey. Rose had slipped ten milligrams of diazepam into his wine.

Chaz groped somewhat imprecisely for her breasts, and she brushed his hand away.

"Stop it," she whispered.

"Your heart's going so fast. What does that mean, Rose?"

If you only knew.

He pressed himself harder against her.

"No."

"Please. I miss her so much," Chaz said.

Joey's eyes gradually adjusted to the dimness of the room. Chaz was lethargic and half-asleep, but she remained on guard.

"Please, Rose. Help me make the pain go away," he said. "Just for tonight."

Without warning Joey started to sob. She couldn't believe it. Sobbing like a baby!

Chaz seemed invigorated by her breakdown, which he no doubt perceived as vulnerability.

"Come on, Rose," he implored, reaching down to tug off his pants, "it'll be healthy for both of us."

"For heaven's sake, how?"

"By getting lost in each other."

That's a new one, Joey thought. Wonder where he stole it. She took a slow, deliberate breath, then sniffed away the tears.

"These are very normal feelings at a time like this," Chaz was saying. "Joey loved us both. She'd understand completely."

"No, Chaz, Joey would not understand."

She said this aloud in her regular voice. He stopped wriggling and raised up slightly, trying to see her face. She heard a dry swallow.

"I assure you," she said, "that she definitely doesn't understand how you could try to fuck her best friend the night after her funeral service.

Chaz seemed paralyzed with confusion. Joey reached into his boxers and twisted a pinch of his scrotum between her thumbnail and forefinger.

"Let go! Oh God," he wailed. "Oh Christ, oh Jesus, please, Joey, let go!"

At the silent count often, she did. "Now don't move, Charles."

She turned on the lamp and saw that he was rolled up like a large pale hedgehog, cupping his groin.

"You're not real." Her husband squinted at her suspiciously. "You can't be real." He bared his teeth and gave off a strange, dissonant laugh. "Lemme see your fingernails."

"Exactly how much have you had to drink?" she asked.

"You're dead, Joey. I killed you myself." Chaz continued to grin like a chimp. "It's all on video!"

She said, "You need to buckle down here, mister. I want some answers."

His head began lolling from side to side, as if his neck had gone to rubber. When he blinked, it looked like hard work.

Joey said, "Don't you dare fall asleep."

"I knew it. I got the West Nile." He cackled harshly. "That's why you're here-the disease makes victims hallucinate."

Rose might have gone overboard with the Valium, Joey thought. The creep was fading fast.

"Chaz, are you listening?"

He nodded. "Loud'n clear."

"Why did you try to kill me?"

"Aw, come on," he snorted.

Joey snatched a shock of his hair and yanked his head upright.

"Answer me!"

"I guarantee you I wasn't the only guy on that cruise who thought about shovin' his old lady overboard. Wives, they think about that shit, too. Every married person now and then thinks, Oh what the fuck. I did it, is the only difference. Me! I went ahead and did it."

Joey found herself scanning the room for something jagged and, preferably, rusty. Then she recalled Mick's warning: Don't make it a crime scene.

She released Chaz's hair and his chin dropped to his chest.

He said, "I thought you were gonna rat me out for faking the water tests."

"But I didn't even know what you were doing!"

"So maybe I overreacted."

"Excuse me?" Joey said.

Chaz scratched absently at a dime-size scab on his neck. "You don't understand. Red's deadly serious when it conies to business."

"It was our anniversary]"

"Oh yeah, I almost forgot." Chaz looked up. "Thanks for the awesome golf-club covers. I found them later in my suitcase."

"You really are a monster," Joey said hoarsely.

"If you were real, I'd tell you I was sorry."

"And I'd tell you to go straight to hell," she said. "Why did you marry me in the first place?"

Chaz seemed truly surprised at the question. "Because you were hot. And we were so fantastic together."

"Because I was hot'?" Joey eyed the lamp's electrical cord and thought: No jury in the country would convict me.

Chaz said, "I'm getting really sleepy. Can you go back to heaven now? Or wherever you came from?"

"Didn't you ever love me?" Joey switched off the light in case she started crying again. "Ever, Chaz?"

"Sure I did."

"Then what happened?" she demanded. "First the whoring around, which was bad enough-"

A wary grunt from the shadows.

"-then you push me overboard on our anniversary cruise! I don't get it," Joey said. "If you wanted out so badly, all you had to do was ask. See, they've got this new thing called divorce."

Now all she heard was the low scrape of heavy breathing. Five, ten, fifteen seconds went by.

"Chaz?"

Nothing.

She jerked the pillow from beneath his head and said, "Wake up, dammit! I'm not finished."

A perturbed, groggy groan. Then: "You can't hurt me, Joey. You're already dead."

Arduously he gathered himself and lunged for her, missing in the dark. She pounced on his back, pinning him to the mattress.

"Because I was 'hot'? Are you serious?" Her mouth was inches from his ear.

"Hey, it's a compliment," Chaz said. "Now, can you please get off me? My hard-on's gettin' bent."

"What a moving sentiment. Are you stealing from Neil Diamond again?"

The door opened, throwing a wedge of light on the bed.

"It's okay. We're fine," Joey said over her shoulder.