Tim Wynne-Jones - The Uninvited

“Because of Jerry Seinfeld?”

Iris shook her head. Then she snapped her fingers. “Cramer Lee,” she said, and turned to Mimi with her dark eyes sparkling.

“What about him?”

Iris dropped her voice. “Cramer Lee was the kid who used to follow Jay around in high school.”

Mimi looked at her in disbelief. “Get out. The one you were talking about? He sounded like a nerdy kind of kid-a twerp.”

“He was,” said Iris. She turned as if to make sure Cramer wasn’t still around. “ That was Cramer Lee we were leering at?”

“I guess.”

Iris made a wry face. “He certainly bulked up.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Mimi, as they took a table. “Pecs, traps-the works.” She picked up her menu and fanned herself vigorously. “Is it hot in here or what?” she said.

He wanted to ask her out. He had a couple more days off. They could do something. He wasn’t sure what. Just go for a walk maybe. Go for that coffee-cash in his rain check. But how? She had his number, but he didn’t have hers. Could he just show up at her place? How about if he ran into her? He could go out running along the Upper Valentine around the time she did. It would be this big coincidence. But would it appear like too much of a coincidence? That’s what he was afraid of. What was far stronger than his fear, however, was his desire to see her.

Friday bloomed an August day of rare perfection. Cramer worked out hard but slow, took his time, enjoyed every curl and crunch. He felt every muscle fiber in his body stretch and contract. He had sculpted himself into something. She had noticed. He had been someone no one noticed, but Mimi had noticed. He’d seen how she looked at him. It was worth every chin-up and dead lift.

He showered and changed and made himself a few sandwiches. He wouldn’t come home at all that day. Mavis wasn’t around. He had offered to drive her into Ottawa for art supplies, but she had said she’d go alone. He wasn’t sure when she was planning on doing that, but he didn’t care anymore. He had gotten her the money she wanted. It had not been easy. And that was it. He was done. The rest was up to her.

From a tree he watched Mimi sitting by the snye in white jeans and a peach-colored halter top, her hair tied up in a rose-colored scarf. She just sat, her feet bare, occasionally reaching out a toe to stir the water gurgling by or leaning back on her elbows until her face was full of dappled sunlight.

How he would have liked to sit there beside her. Not talking-not doing anything. Not so much as touching her. He had never felt like that before. Someone he just wanted to be with.

He would take her out in Bunny. He could imagine her leaning back against the thwart-except he’d take pillows along for her to lean on. She could drag her fingers in the water, like in some old movie or like that. They would have a picnic-he knew just where. He’d buy wine. He’d ask her to choose. She could teach him about things like that: wine and fancy stuff and conversation.

He suddenly felt this huge sense of shame about what he had done to them. To Jay as well as Mimi. It was envy, jealousy. It had coursed through his veins as thick as sludge. But that had all changed. Kind of like open-heart surgery.

Mimi got up and walked back to the house. She came out a few minutes later in a bikini, with her flotation device on. She took the kayak and made her way down the snye to the river. He followed her on foot, along the bank, a safe distance back, quiet as a ghost. He watched her from the shore. He imagined her overturning and him swimming out to save her. He imagined giving her mouth-to-mouth, watching her chest rise and fall as life flowed back into her lungs. Then, as her eyes opened and she saw who it was that had saved her, she would take the hand resting on her chest and she would hold it against her breast.

At a little after six, Iris showed up at the snye in the white Camry in a turquoise blouse and black skirt and slingbacks, with her hair tied back in a yellow ribbon. She had just come from work, he guessed. She was carrying a bag from the liquor store. Jay, all dressed in white, met her at the bridge, and they kissed for a long time, before they made their way across the bridge, balancing with their arms out on a plank someone had placed there.

There was a perfect breeze on this perfect day, so the mosquitoes stayed away. The three friends moved a table out onto the grass and placed a white tablecloth on it and set it with plates and silverware. Soon they were sitting there eating some kind of salad and drinking wine.

The summer evening closed in around the dinner party on the lawn. It wasn’t completely dark, but they brought out tea candles. Cramer shimmied down his tree and moved silently closer. They would not hear him. Jay had his acoustic guitar, and they were singing. They drank and sang and laughed. Then one or the other of them would drift into the house and come back with something else to eat or another bottle of wine. And Cramer imagined walking out of the gathering night right up to the table.

“Cramer!” Mimi would say, and throw her arms around him. “I was just thinking about you.” Then he would drift into the house and return with a chair of his own. He would watch and listen. That would be enough. He would smile at the right moment, be careful not to drink too fast or too much. He would be attentive-he was good at that. He would leap up to get more fruit or whatever.

“No, let me,” he would say. And Mimi would touch his hand. And then…

And then what?

The mosquitoes didn’t move in until 9:05, and the dinner party broke up only to reassemble inside. Slapping at bugs, Cramer waited most of another hour, drawing as close to the house as he dared, hoping for one more glimpse of her.

Bats escaped from the eaves of the little house and swooshed around him, gorging on the mosquitoes and not making a dent in the population. Still he stayed on, steadfast. It was what he knew how to do. And there was another reason for staying. That old bastard Stooley Peters. Mimi wasn’t alone tonight, but Cramer would stay as long as he could, keeping guard. He would be her guardian if he couldn’t be anything else. This would be the good secret to offset the bad secret. This would be the decent thing he did to compensate for all the wrongness.

It was the next day, Saturday, when tragedy struck. The sun was just going down when she came outside, and to his shock he saw that she was crying. What could have happened? He had been close enough to hear her cell phone go off-that old song by Queen. Was it the man with the foreign-sounding name that made her cry? The one she had dumped? What had he done now, because Mimi was weeping-holding herself and weeping. Cramer wanted to swing down out of his roost and take her in his arms. The sky was still light enough to see her face, and although it was disfigured with tears, it was as lovely as ever. Even more beautiful because it was filled with need. He wanted to kiss her tears away, hold her tight. And it was in that rush of yearning that his foot slipped. He didn’t fall but he swung out for one tense moment, and in grabbing for a handhold, a branch snapped off in his grasp, cracking loudly.

It was all over in a moment. She had not seen him; he was sure of it. But she was aware of his presence. Through the thick foliage of the maple, he saw her looking around. She stopped crying. She was staring up into the trees, sniffing, wiping her eyes on her sleeve. He didn’t dare breathe.

When she spoke, she didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t sound frightened or even angry, but her words were like knives.

“You are a sick person,” she said. “Do you know that? You are really sick.” She walked down toward the snye until she was almost beneath him. “What have we done to make you hate us so much?”