Ryan Jahn - The Last Tomorrow

Vivian’s her friend, has done more than anyone to help her, but she’s probably at work, and wouldn’t understand anyway. And even if she did understand, there’s something about talking to a stranger that appeals to her, that feels safer. A stranger can’t judge you, and if he does judge you it doesn’t matter. You can simply walk away.

She picks up the telephone and makes the call.

A woman picks up.

‘Hoffman Boarding.’

‘Is Detective Bachman in?’

‘Hold on.’

The telephone is set down. This is followed by a knocking sound, the woman saying call for you, Bachman, are you there? Open the door. And then silence.

After a while the woman’s voice in her ear: ‘He isn’t in.’

‘Can I leave a message?’

‘Okay.’

‘Can you tell him Candice Richardson called?’

‘Candice Richardson?’

‘Sandy’s mother.’

‘Does he have your phone number?’

‘Trinity nine five one fifty.’

‘Would you like to say what it’s regarding?’

‘No,’ she says, ‘thank you.’ She sets the phone down.

She wonders if he’ll call back. Part of her hopes he doesn’t.

2

Evelyn steps into her dress and pulls it up over her shoulders. The fabric is smooth and delicate and feels good brushing across her skin. She zips up the back of the dress, feeling inexplicably nervous. She tells herself it’s not going to be a real date; it’s work. Speaking of which: she walks to her suitcase and in one of the side pockets finds a black-handled switchblade knife. She presses a button. The spring-loaded blade flips out, and she examines it a moment, looking at her distorted reflection in its steel. Then she folds the blade into the handle and slips the knife into her purse.

Lou has a second knife, identical to this one, which he’ll use elsewhere when the time is right.

She walks to the bathroom, picks up a lipstick from the bathroom counter, smears it on her lips. She rubs her lips against one another, liking the slightly grainy feel of the lubrication the lipstick supplies. She blows herself a kiss.

She’s ready.

Eugene isn’t due for half an hour, and when he arrives she’ll still make him wait ten minutes, simply sit up here flipping through a magazine, but she wants to look good, needs to look good.

Needs him to fall for her.

3

Carl steps from his car, slams the door shut, and walks toward the boarding house. He’s covered in oily sweat and disgusted by his own stink, a sour smell like curdled milk. He spent his last two hours at work doing nothing but watching the clock, refusing to let himself leave early. If he left early that would mean he was no longer in control. Things have been slipping lately. He found a way to use at work every day this week — once while locked in a toilet stall, hoping against hope that no one would walk in and smell that distinctive smell and know. Every day this week he’s used at work. Every day but today. He realized he was losing control. He needed to prove to himself that he could regain control of the situation, of himself. And he did. He made it. He made it through the work day without using. True, the last two hours it was all he thought about, getting into his room at the boarding house and unfolding his bindle, but thoughts are not actions. Only actions are actions.

And he acted like a man in control.

He was a man in control. Barely in control, perhaps, but in control.

He pushes through the front door and hurries up the stairs, tripping on his way, hurting his wrist and cursing under his breath, but not stopping, scrambling on all fours up the last few steps, and then into his room. He locks the door behind him. He walks to the dresser sitting against the back wall and pulls open the top drawer. He removes the brown paper bag, walks to the bed with it, sits down. Then his eye catches something on the floor, a white piece of paper. Mrs Hoffman must have slipped it under the door. He wonders for a moment if he’s late on rent, but rent is due on Mondays and he knows he already paid this week. He should pick it up and see what it says. If he’s in control of himself he’ll pick it up and see what it says. A normal person would do that, and he’s a normal person. Things have been slipping lately, but they’re under control. He’s under control. He wills his fingers to let go the bag and sets it on the bed. He picks up the slip of paper and looks at it. Someone named Candice Richardson called for him.

Who the fuck is Candice Richardson?

He closes his eyes and tries to think. First he thinks of nothing, just the itch at the back of his brain, then her face appears in his mind, and then other images float forward, as if emerging through a fog. A 1948 Chevrolet with a man lying beside it. A zip gun made from a car antenna. A comic book. The mother of the boy who killed his stepfather. He should call her. He told her to call him if she needed anything and she did, despite the fact she told him she never would, despite the fact she told him she would never forgive him for taking her boy away from her. She called because she saw it on him, or smelled it on him: death. He’s someone who understands.

He should call her back.

But not now. After. He made it through the day. He deserves this.

He picks up the paper bag and one by one removes the items from within it, setting them out on the bed in a neat row, in a tidy line, almost enjoying the discomfort of his need now that it’s about to be satisfied, enjoying the ritual.

He’ll call her back after.

4

The elevator doors open. Evelyn emerges from within, like some creature hatched from an egg, and sways toward Eugene, svelte and fluid and serpentine. A smile touches her lips as she walks toward him, and her eyes are alive with humor and sensuality. He called up to her room over ten minutes ago, but it was certainly worth the wait. He gets to his feet and takes a step forward to greet her. Seeing her is almost enough to make him forget the envelope he opened this morning and what he found within it. Almost. But even though the worry floats around the back of his mind he knows he can do nothing about it. He must simply wait, see what happens.

He leans in and kisses her cheek. He can smell clean sweat on her, the kind of sweat you want to lick off, and soap, and that soft flowery perfume that’s so unlike the woman herself.

‘You look beautiful,’ he says into her ear.

‘I know,’ she says.

5

The knock at the door comes sooner than expected. He only called her back fifteen minutes ago, and she wasn’t sure when they got off the phone that he’d actually show up. He seemed distant and strange during their conversation, halting in his speech, but despite this she is inexplicably looking forward to seeing this man who helped to arrest her son. She walks to the door and pulls it open. Detective Bachman stands on the other side in a wrinkled gray suit and scuffed shoes, his weathered face hanging there dead till he sees her and puts a smile on it. He removes his fedora and holds it in front of his chest as if she were the national anthem.

‘Mrs Richardson.’

‘Candice.’

‘Candice, then. Are you ready?’

His eyes seem glossy and far away, and much of the emotion that was evident on his face the night she met him appears to have vanished, is completely absent. She wasn’t herself that night. Perhaps she misjudged him. Perhaps her memory of him was distorted by what she was going through. She hesitates, wondering if this was a bad idea, wondering if she should just stay home.

She glances back over her shoulder and cannot stand the sight of her empty house. It feels oppressive, the emptiness, and she wants to get away from it. At least temporarily.

‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘I’m ready.’