J. Jance - Rattlesnake Crossing

"Since I haven't written Chapter One yet, that seems a bit premature. So no, I haven’t"

"Well, you should," she said. "When it comes time to start, that's what's supposed to go on the title page-the book's title and the author's name."

"Butch Dixon," he said slowly, sounding it out. "That doesn't have much of a ring to it. Sounds like somebody who'd write auto-repair manuals. No. Butch Dixon isn't going to cut it. And Frederick Dixon isn't much better."

"Then what's your middle name?" Joanna asked.

"Why do you want to know?"

"I just want to, that's all."

Butch sighed. "I hate my middle name," he said. "I haven't had enough to drink to start telling people my middle name."

"You're not telling people," Joanna objected. "You're only telling me."

"Wilcox," he said with a glower. "Not two 1's like the town. One 1."

"Why don't you use your initials, then?" Joanna suggested. "If you're writing about a female protagonist, people might think you're a woman. Let's say Faye Wanda Dixon."

Butch choked on a sip of champagne. "Faye Wanda!" he repeated. "'That's awful."

"But you see what I mean."

"Okay, F. W. Dixon, then. That's all right, I suppose. But doesn't it sound familiar? I'm sure I know of a writer by that name."

When they finally managed to dredge the name Franklin W. Dixon out of their Hardy Boys memory banks, they gave up eating altogether and collapsed on the floor amid gales of helpless laughter. Joanna couldn't remember laughing like that in years. It felt good. What remained of her day's awful burden lightened and disappeared entirely.

"No wonder the name sounded familiar!" Butch gasped, wiping the tears from his eyes. "We were just talking about him. And I can still see it now, the name and the initials printed on the skinny little spines of those tan-and-brown books. What's funny is, I already owned both the F and the W and I didn't even realize it. And you're right, of course. Good old Franklin W.-F. W.-was a woman masquerading under a man's pen name, right?"

"Right," Joanna agreed. "Turnabout's fair play."

Eventually they got up, cleared the table, and loaded the dishes into the dishwasher. With the kitchen cleaned up and the dishwasher running, they took their last glasses of champagne out onto the front porch to sit in the swing and watch the stars. It was chilly enough outside to make Joanna wish she'd brought along a sweater.

Butch noticed her rubbing her arms. "It never gets this cool in Phoenix during the summer," he said. "Too much humidity. Too much pavement."

"Are you going to miss Phoenix?" she asked.

"I wondered about that, but don't think so." He paused. In the interim, a roving band of coyotes howled back and forth across the valley.

"See there?" Butch added. "You don’t hear very much of that in Peoria anymore. No, I don't think I'll miss the city at all."

"So that's why you were so busy the last few weeks? You were working on the deal to sell the Roundhouse?" He nodded.

"I was worried," she said. "Especially when I called and the phone was disconnected. I thought maybe…"

"Maybe what?"

"I thought maybe you'd taken up with some other woman."

"That was bothering me, too," he said glumly. "I wasn't hearing much from you, either. You kept saying you were helping out a lot with Ruth and Esther, but I was obsessed by the idea that some other guy had moved into the picture."

"So we were both… well… jealous."

"I guess so."

"Don't you think that's funny?" Joanna asked.

"No," Butch said, shaking his head. "It's not funny at all. I'd hate like hell to lose you, Joanna." His voice seemed to break when it came time to say her name, as though he could barely stand to say the word aloud. Surprised, Joanna turned to look at him, but he kept his gaze averted.

"You mean that, don't you?" she said.

There was real wonder in her voice. After months of bantering back and forth, after months of what she had regarded as just having fun, she had finally caught a glimmer, a hint, of the depth of feeling Butch Dixon kept hidden under layers of jokes and easy laughter.

"Please, Joanna," he groaned. "Let's just drop it. I promised last night that I wouldn't rush you, and I'm not going to. I just want to be here, that's all. I'm not asking for anything more than that. I'm not making any demands."

She moved closer to him on the swing, letting the bare skin of her leg meet tip with the soft, worn denim of his jeans. Then she reached out and took his hand. "I wouldn't want to lose you, either," she said. She raised his tightly clenched fist to her lips and kissed the back of it. Under that light caress she felt the tension recede from Butch's hand and body both.

"Wouldn't you like to come inside?" she whispered. "No," he said. "Really. I think I'd better go. Now, before things end up getting out of hand."

For months Joanna had determinedly refused to acknowledge the aching tensions and urgent sexual needs of her body. By denying their very existence she had managed to survive, had managed to keep the fires inside her banked, her longings under wraps. Now, though, to her utter amazement, Butch Dixon had broken through her resolve, and had let a demanding and insistent genie out of its carefully bottled imprisonment. After months of self-denial, Joanna Brady suddenly realized that she was still young and still alive. It was time.

Letting Butch's hand fall back in his lap, she reached up and brushed her lips across the firm muscles of his jawline. "Things are already out of hand," she whispered. "So maybe we'd both better go inside."

The dream overtook Joanna hours later. The sky overhead was deceptively blue as she walked across a grassy field. Far away, under a tree, stood a group of boys. "What are you doing?" she called to them. "What are you up to?"

They didn't answer, but even without being told, Joanna somehow knew. They had captured a frog from a nearby stream, and she hurried forward, determined to rescue the creature. In order to save it, she had to move faster, but her feet and legs seemed mired in mud or deep, river-bottom sand.

"You stop that now!" she shouted. "You shouldn't do that. It's not nice."

One of the boys turned and peered at her over his shoulder. Then his mouth twisted into an ugly, gargoylelike smile. He laughed and pointed, and the other boys looked, too, while Joanna churned forward, propelled by a terrible sense of urgency mixed with an equal amount of dread.

She reached the outside of the tightly knit circle. "Let me in," she shouted. "What are you doing?" As she tried to see over one boy's shoulder, he seemed to swell before her very eyes, growing upward and upward until he towered over her. She went to the next boy, and the same thing happened. One at a time, the boys transformed themselves into huge, thick-limbed giants. They closed ranks and shouldered her out of the way, but now there was a sound coming from inside the circle-a terrible whimpering.

"Please stop now," Joanna pleaded. "Please. Didn't your mothers teach you any better than this?"

One of the giants whirled around and glared down at her. "Mothers?" he said. "Mothers? We don't need no stinkin' mothers." He laughed. Then, with a shrug, he turned and walked away. One by one, the others followed. Joanna watched them leave. Only when the last one had disappeared beyond the crest of a hill did Joanna turn her attention to the bloodied form of the unfortunate creature they had left behind.

At first she couldn't tell what it was. But when she stepped closer she realized it was a child: Jenny. A Jenny with no arms or legs, lying helpless and screaming in the gore-covered grass.

The horrifying dream dissolved as suddenly as if someone had flicked a switch. In the nightmare's absence, the keening; awful scream remained.