Lisa Unger - Darkness My Old Friend

The cat was missing, and that wasn’t really like him. He was fat and lazy, rarely moving at more than a snail’s pace from couch to food bowl, food bowl to bed, bed to window seat. Even when he could be bothered to heft his frame through the kitty door, he did not, once outside, chase birds or rodents. He observed squirrels and finches, mice and robins with studied indifference. Eloise had never even bothered to put a little bell on his collar, knowing that it was the sun alone that drew him outside. He did not have a hunter’s heart. He was a creature designed for, and dedicated to, luxuriating. He cared only to lie on the stone bench by the sundial and let his ginger fur soak up the heat. Then, having reached some unknown limit, he’d trundle back inside and replant himself.

“Oliver,” she called. She stood on the back stoop. The wind made the various chimes, hanging from the eaves and trees, sing. Eloise hated the cooling air of autumn. It heralded the arrival of snow and black branches, the death of everything green.

“Oliver.”

Eloise felt an anxious flutter as she gazed about the yard and then shut the door. The cat could be under one of the beds or down in the basement. He’d come back when he was hungry, she told herself. Lord knew he couldn’t survive in the wild.

Back inside, she heard her cell phone ringing. She walked over to the kitchen table and dug the phone out of her purse, even though she had no intention of answering it. Ray Muldune, the blinking screen informed her. Again. She put the phone down on the table and watched it skitter a bit with its vibrating.

Ray wanted her to tell him things that she couldn’t tell him. She was cold, stone cold, except for her dreams of Jones Cooper. This happened sometimes, a mental loop excluding all other signals. That’s why she’d gone to see him, knowing full well how he would react to her. She figured she’d get it out, deliver the message. And maybe that’s all she was supposed to do. Maybe. She never knew.

Eloise was about to open a can of food for Oliver. Doing so, she knew, would cause him to lumber from wherever he was, near or far. But as she pulled open the cupboard, she heard the crunching of gravel on her driveway. She walked over to the bay window and looked out to see Ray Muldune’s ancient Caddy in the driveway.

Her phone issued a single buzz. She pulled it from her pocket.

YOU’RE AVOIDING ME, his text message accused.

“Oh, Ray,” she said out loud, though there was no one there to hear her. “You never could take a hint.”

Then he was on her porch, his authoritative knock causing the panes to rattle. She went to the door and looked at him through the glass.

“I’ve got nothing for you, Ray,” she said. She didn’t move to let him in.

“Okay,” he said. He gazed off to the side of the house. He did that a lot, talked to her but looked elsewhere. He did it with everyone, as though he were always scanning the area for threats or problems. “I get it. How about a coffee? You got that for me?”

She felt the smile bubble up from inside her. It was rare for her, a true smile, true affection for another. She and Ray had worked together for a long, long time. He was the closest thing she had to a friend.

She gave him a scowl that she knew neither fooled nor daunted him and let him in. His energy was big, caused her to back up and bow her head. His size-six-four and, he claimed, 210, but she knew better-dwarfed her. His aroma-stale cigar, though he promised to quit-overwhelmed her. And rain. Beneath the smoke he smelled like rain, something pure and fresh from the air. He was losing his hair, a spreading shine on the back of his head, a retreat at the widow’s peak. But somehow he was handsomer, more virile than the day they’d met, many years ago. The deep lines around his eyes, the gray in his stubble, only served him. She, on the other hand, had withered and dried, looked ten years older than she was. She knew this because the mirror didn’t lie and photos didn’t even bother to be kind about it.

Ray wanted to talk. By the time she followed him to the kitchen, he was already in her cupboards, pulling down the coffee can and filters.

She pulled up a chair at the kitchen table and sat. She traced the grain of the wood with her finger. She still wore her wedding and engagement rings, though her husband was long, long gone. She was glad she’d remembered to put her prescription bottles away in the cabinet over the sink. If she’d left them out, Ray would have noticed them, because he never missed anything. And that was a conversation she didn’t want to have, not tonight.

Ray made a lot of noise-banging mugs, turning on the faucet full blast to fill the pot, slamming the refrigerator door. That was his way. He was physical, expressing his frustrations through movement. He was also prone to bear hugs and big gestures with his hands. Beside him she felt small and unnaturally reserved, like a plain wooden shack weathering his storm.

“I told you I’d call if anything,” she said. “By now you should know how it works.”

He stopped moving for a second to look at her pointedly. “I don’t know how it works, and neither do you.”

“Well,” she said. She raised her palms in surrender. “We both know that stalking and nagging don’t help.”

He grunted and pushed the button on the ancient Mr. Coffee. “Get a new machine, Eloise.”

“It still works,” she said. “Why should I replace it?” The pot gurgled its agreement.

“Because your coffee tastes like axle grease.”

“I’ll take this opportunity to remind you that you were not invited for coffee.”

He sat at the table, across from her, the chair whining beneath his weight. Then he took a tin of breath mints from his pocket and popped one into his mouth, rattled the box at her. She lifted a hand to decline.

“Seems like 1987 was a hundred years ago,” she said.

“Not to our client. To him it was yesterday.”

Ray slid forward on his elbows, frowned at her. He thought she’d grown jaded, cold. No, she wasn’t that. He stood up quickly then, banged around in the kitchen some more, and then came back to the table with two mugs.

The coffee smelled rank-bitter and acidic. It reminded her she hadn’t smelled anything that even remotely stimulated her appetite. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d been hungry.

“You used to care,” he said. He put the cups on the table, sat down again heavily.

“I still do.”

She wanted to explain to him the difference between apathy and acceptance. She, unlike most, no longer labored under the delusion of control. She had released most of her attachments. And in doing so she had found, if not peace exactly, then at least calm. To others, still grappling with their misconceptions about the world, their relationships, their lives, this could look like depraved indifference. They still suffered. She did not.

“I have nothing for you, Ray.” She looked down at the second cup of coffee poured for her today that she had no intention of drinking.

“You’re not trying,” he said. “You’re all wrapped up in this Jones Cooper thing.”

“I went to see him.”

He raised his eyebrows at her. “Really? You told him?”

She recounted the conversation for him.

Ray shook his head. “That guy is a closed door.”

“Yes and no.”

“Well, good. Maybe that’s what you needed to do. Maybe it will free you up.”

“That’s my hope. You’re not the only person who wants something from me.” She found herself staring at the kitty door, willing Oliver to squeeze himself through, mewing for dinner. The sun was getting low. Where was that stupid cat?