David Corbett - The Devil’s Redhead

It’s not his price to pay, she thought. You can’t do this to him. Go back.

She turned from the window, ran to the toilet and vomited. Her head rang, the bile was clear and sour. She couldn’t tell if it was her fear or something wrong with her head that brought this on. As though it matters, she thought. She collapsed onto her haunch on the cold tile floor.

The situation had a certain storybook quality, she decided. The maiden who descends into Hell to beg back her soul from the Devil. If memory served, the story did not end well. The maiden gets screwed. And that, she supposed- to use Frank’s expression- is fitting and fair.

If they didn’t already have Frank in hand, they’d use her for bait. Picturing what was likely to follow, she felt sick with terror again and hoisted herself up, preparing to retch, but nothing came. The perfect posture, she thought, for realizing you have no choice. She felt in need of a prayer. In need of a saint who would listen to it. St. Dismal.

She rose, rinsed her face and mouth with cold water then staggered back down the hallway to the bedroom. She looked around one final time. Calling to mind the words on Abatangelo’s scapular, she told herself: Remember me. Remember me, Danny, because I love you. And that’s why I can’t stay. I can’t bring my nightmare here. I’ll take it back where it belongs.

She drove with one hand on the wheel, the other clutching her head, focusing on the road’s white lines. A dull throbbing tinged with nausea was interrupted by a flare of pain from behind one eye. She winced and struggled to keep a grip on the wheel. She wasn’t entirely sure what was happening, but the headache was getting worse, and every time one of these flare-ups occurred, she felt dizzy and everything blurred.

To combat her growing fear she picked a song, the first that came to mind, a number she loved from the old days, Rickie Lee Jones: “We Belong Together.” She sang it to herself, over and over, the way a mother sings to a child in a storm.

And I can hear him in every footstep’s passing sigh

He goes crazy these nights

watching heartbeats go by

and they whisper- We belong together

You’re not gonna look back, she told herself, you’re not gonna whine and whimper, you’re gonna feel good about seeing Danny one last time, letting him know what he means to you, then do what needs to get done. You’re gonna face Felix, you’re gonna tell him the whole deal, you’re gonna get square with him or die. Tell him: You want revenge, here it is.

And you told her to stand tall when you kissed her…

No need to go hunting, Felix. Leave Danny out of it. Leave everybody but me out of it. The deal was you and me. I keep Frank in the saddle, I live, he lives. At least for a while. Can’t say I know all the facts, but I’d be willing to bet “in the saddle” is a reach. So here I am. It ain’t marriage, Felix, granted, but it’s what I bring to the table. I may be a lot of things, but one thing I am not is some two-faced sob sister trying to squeeze pity out of a rock. I don’t try to crawl back over a bridge I just burned down. I don’t beg back my last chance. And if that means I’m stuck, well hey. I can dig it. I’m stuck.

She reached the ranch house an hour later, by which time the song lyrics and monologue had done the trick. She felt braced for the worst. And that inspired a state of mind that strangely calmed her.

She gained the doorway after a dizzying effort on the porch stairs. Rowena stood at the very center of the kitchen, cigarette in one hand, book of matches in the other, looking for all the world as though she’d been standing in exactly that spot for days. A smell like burnt gum lingered in the air. A tin can full of menthol butts rested on the stove. From further within the house the babble of Duval’s television leaked from beyond his bedroom door.

“What the fuck happened to you?” Rowena said as Shel entered the light. Her tone of voice suggested she actually meant to ask: Is it going to happen to me? Shel didn’t answer, but instead concerted her strength to work her way along the wall to the breakfast nook where she took a seat. Setting her head on the tabletop, she closed her eyes.

“Where’s Roy?” Rowena asked, her voice rising. “I been over to the house, walked the whole damn way and back, over a mile. Nobody there. Not Roy, not Lyle. I been back to the compound, three times since dark. Nobody there, neither. I got a bad feeling. You know something, tell me. I got a right to know. I got a kid, remember?” She waited for an answer, and getting none, moved closer. “To hell with you. To hell with Frank.” She clutched the side of the table and shook it. “You hear me? Things were fine, they were going goddamn fine, then Frank. Fuck him and you, the two of you, I got no place to go, I got no money, no car, I had to hitch my ass back here from the movie me and Duval got shipped to last night. You tell me and you tell me now what the hell’s going on.”

She made a halfhearted lunge at Shel, then changed tack and started ransacking her pockets.

“You got money, you give it to me. Give it!”

Her hands pecked at Shel’s clothing. Shel tried and failed to fend her off. In the end she put her hands up, thinking, God help me, touching her hair. Her head felt like it was going to come apart.

“The truck,” Shel said finally. “Maybe…”

Rowena found Shel’s keys in her pant pocket. She ripped them out and backed away from the table.

“ ’Bout time,” she said. She gathered her coat from the back of a chair and strode to the rear doorway, calling out, “Duval, you stay put, hear? I’ll be back.” She struggled with her coat then turned to face Shel. “Look at you,” she said with disgust. “Come back looking like a punching bag. You’re pathetic, know that? You deserve what you get.”

Shortly Shel heard the truck start up and the tires throwing gravel. She set her head back down on the table and looked about the kitchen as though for the last time. The wall clock ticked, the refrigerator hummed. A cobweb hung like a strand of hair in the ceiling corner. On the window ledge, a tiny fern she’d bought at Walgreens struggled to grow inside a Mickey Mouse cup. The ageless mouse smiled back at her with berserk joy. I’ve come back here to save the people I love, she told Mickey. I’ve come back to state my case to the Devil.

She found herself singing again, the same tune as before. “We belong together,” she repeated, over and over, eyes closed. Outside, the wind picked up. Tree limbs scraped the walls of the house, banging the gutters along the roof. The noise roused her, she opened her eyes.

Duval stood just beyond the table’s edge, staring at her.

“Hey,” Shel whispered. She worked up a smile and reached out her hand. The boy backed away.

“Now don’t,” she said. She struggled upright. The room swam. “Help Aunt Shel to her feet, all right? She’s got some medicine in the basement. She’ll feel worlds better if you just give her a hand.”

Duval continued edging away. All of sudden, with the same blank expression he wore for everyone, he spun around and lunged from the room, fleeing back down the hall. Shortly his door slammed shut and the latch was thrown.

Got a real streak going with the fellas right now, Shel thought.

She gained her balance and removed her shoes, the better to feel the floor beneath her. Using the wall, she edged down the hallway, stumbled to the narrow door, and peered down the wood plank stairway to the cellar. Vertigo greeted her at the bottom. Who put this chasm in my house? The overhead lamp swayed back and forth, tipped by her own hand reaching for the chain. Shadows ballooned then shrank on opposite walls. She drew a breath so deep it made her cough, then gripped the handrail, sliding down step by step.