Phillip Margolin - Lost Lake

Vanessa was a hard-drinking, rail-thin chain-smoker with snarled blond hair and pale blue eyes. The forty-nine-year-old reporter paid no attention to her looks and favored baggy jeans and bulky sweaters, unless she was on assignment. Tonight, she’d cleaned up a little and was wearing a black leather jacket over a T-shirt and tight jeans.

Vanessa looked at her watch. It was almost nine, and Warmouth had said she’d be at the tavern at eight-thirty. Vanessa decided to give her another scotch’s worth of time before heading home. Sam Cutler, her boyfriend, was out on an assignment at some rock concert anyway, and there was nothing on the tube. She could think of worse ways to spend her time than drinking in the ambience created by smoke, loud country music, and raucous pool players.

A sudden draft told Vanessa that someone had opened the door. She shifted her gaze from the scarred tabletop to the front of the tavern. A heavyset, big-haired woman wearing too much makeup was bathed in the red-green light of the jukebox. She cast anxious glances around the bar until Vanessa raised her hand. The woman hurried over.

“Vanessa Kohler from Exposed, ” she said as she handed Warmouth her card. The woman’s hand shook when she took it.

“Sorry I’m late,” Warmouth apologized. She sat down and laid Vanessa’s card on the table next to a puddle of beer. “This is Larry’s bowling night and his ride was late.”

“Perfectly understandable,” Vanessa said.

“I couldn’t let him know I was going out. He’d want to know where I was going and who I was meeting. I just hope he doesn’t call from the alley. I’ll be up all night getting grilled.”

She flashed a weak smile, looking for sympathy. It took Vanessa a moment to catch on. She flashed back a smile that she hoped conveyed female solidarity.

“Can I buy you a beer?” the reporter asked.

“That sounds good.”

Vanessa signaled for the waitress and ordered a pitcher.

“So, Terri, you ready to tell your story?” Vanessa asked when the waitress left.

“Yeah, sure,” she said, though she didn’t sound so sure.

Vanessa placed a tape recorder on the table between them. “Do you mind if I record this so I can report what you tell me accurately?” she asked, omitting the part about the recording being primo evidence whenever a fruitcake decided to sue.

Warmouth hesitated but then said, “Sure, okay.”

Vanessa pressed “record.”

“This is going to be in the paper, right, with my real name and everything?” Warmouth asked.

“You bet.”

“Because it’s the only way Larry will believe it, if it’s in Exposed. He reads it like the Bible, every week. He says it’s the only paper he can trust.”

“It’s good to know we have such loyal readers.”

“That’s why I called you, on account of Larry being such a loyal reader.”

“Right. So, as I understand it, you’re pregnant?”

Warmouth looked down at the table and nodded.

“You’ve got to speak up for the recorder, Terri,” Vanessa reminded her.

“Oh, right. Yeah, I’m…I got…”

“Pregnant.”

“Right.”

“And this was a surprise?”

Warmouth reddened. “Yeah, I’ll say.” She looked up, her eyes begging for understanding. “Larry’s going to know it’s not his. We tried like crazy after we was married.” Warmouth hesitated. “You ain’t going to put this part in the paper, are you?”

“Not if you don’t want me to.”

“Well, don’t. It would embarrass him something awful.”

“What would?”

“The doctor told us I’m okay, but Larry’s sperm don’t swim so fast. I don’t understand all of it, but it made him feel terrible, unmanly, you know. So, he’ll know it weren’t his kid.”

“And whose kid will it be?” Vanessa prodded.

“The alien’s.”

“The ones who abducted you from the parking lot of the Cruise On Inn?”

“Yes,” Warmouth answered in a little voice that Vanessa could barely hear over the noise in the bar.

“Tell me how it happened.”

“I was here…”

“What night was this?”

“Same as tonight. Larry’s bowling night.”

“So, Larry didn’t know you were out on the town?”

“Uh, no.”

“Were you alone?” Vanessa asked, watching Warmouth carefully when she answered. Her interviewee ducked her head and turned deep red.

“Yeah, just me,” she said.

“How come you came here? The Cruise On is pretty far from your house.”

“It ain’t so far from work.”

“Been here with some of your pals from work, have you?”

“Some of my girlfriends,” she answered too quickly.

“But that night you were on your own?”

“Yes. And it got late, so I knew I’d have to go so I’d be home when Larry got home. He doesn’t like me going off on my own.”

“Larry’s the jealous type?”

“I’ll say. He’s always going on about how guys stare at me and accusing me of staring back, when I’m not. It’s sort of flattering, but it can get on your nerves, if you know what I mean.”

“You bet,” Vanessa answered with a nod. “So, tell me about the aliens.”

“Yeah, okay. So I went out to my car, which was over at the end of the lot, and I was just about to open the door when I heard this like humming sound, and I looked up and there it was.”

“There what was?”

“The ship. It was big and spinning and it looked like a saucer, but with lights.”

“Any special color lights?”

“Uh, green, I think. I don’t remember real well. I was pretty shook. But it did look like a lot of those alien ships you write about in your paper. So it was probably from the same planet.”

“Which planet is that?”

“They never said, but some of the other ones who got abducted knew the name of the planet and I bet it was one of those, since the ship was so similar.”

“What happened after you saw the ship?”

“Well, that’s where it gets hazy. I do recall a beam of light coming down. But after that it’s like you get when you have an operation and they give you drugs.”

“Some of our abductees have said it’s like a good high.”

“Yeah, sort of like that. You know how you sort of float. Well that’s what I was doing. But I do remember I was strapped down on this table and I didn’t have any clothes on. And this tall one was on top of me.”

“Having sex?”

“I don’t know what they do. I didn’t really feel anything. And then I was back in the parking lot.”

“Naked?”

“Uh, no, the aliens must have put my clothes on.”

“And the ship was nowhere to be seen?”

“No, they must have left after they beamed me back down.”

“Made their getaway before anyone could see them?”

“Yeah, made their getaway,” Terri echoed softly.

Terri was crying. Vanessa switched off the tape recorder. She reached across the table and took Warmouth’s hand.

“Larry’s not going to buy this, Terri. I know you’re hoping he will because he likes my paper, but he’s going to know.”

Terri’s shoulders were shaking, and the tears were pouring down.

“Who is it? Someone from work?”

Warmouth’s head bobbed up and down for a second. When she lifted her tear-streaked face Vanessa tried to remember if she’d ever seen anyone who looked so miserable.

“But he says it isn’t his,” Warmouth said between gulps for air. “He…he says I must have been sleeping around or it’s Larry’s.”

“Sounds like a real nice guy,” Vanessa observed.

Warmouth wiped her eyes. “I sure thought he was.”

“So you can’t count on this guy and you can’t tell your husband.”