Jonathan Nasaw - Fear itself

He had no way of telling how long he’d been in there before Simon came for him again. Long enough for two anxiety attacks, the first more acute, the second of longer duration. Pounding heart, vertigo, shortness of breath, hysterical paresis, feelings of dread so intense that a vasovagal syncope would have come as a blessing-unfortunately, Nelson wasn’t subject to syncopes.

During the paretic phase of the second attack, as he lay on the floor of the closet with his hands tied behind him, the muscles of his legs so weak and trembly he might as well have been paralyzed, Nelson’s ears registered the snick of the closet door being unlocked.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” called Simon, cheerfully.

No fucking way. His legs still too weak to propel him, Nelson dragged himself in the opposite direction, away from the door, away from the voice, humping like an inchworm until he could hump no farther, and curled up hyperventilating in the far corner of the closet, waiting to learn what fresh hell Simon had in store for him.

He would have to wait a little longer, though-the door never opened. Instead he heard footsteps padding across the bedroom carpet-retreating footsteps.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” Simon called again, from the hallway this time, and again Nelson told himself no fucking way. But they both knew he’d be coming out eventually-his claustrophobia would see to that.

If there was a more terrifying, more vulnerable feeling than tottering forward through total darkness with your hands tied behind you, Nelson told himself, he’d just as soon not know about it. Every few steps he’d stop, listen. The only sounds in the bedroom were Nelson’s own ragged breathing and the furious pounding of his heart.

All the silence meant, of course, was that Simon was waiting for him elsewhere in the house. But if so, Nelson began to realize, even if Simon was standing right outside the bedroom door, then his old friend had miscalculated for once. Simon must have failed to notice that the bedroom door was reinforced with steel to make it fireproof and furnished with a dead bolt, in the unlikely event an intruder ever succeeded in breaking into the house.

Suddenly Nelson couldn’t get enough air; he felt as if his heart were about to burst inside him, spattering the inside of his chest cavity with blood and shredded muscle. Another panic attack? No-it was hope, a sensation far less familiar to Nelson. All he had to do, he told himself, was get that stout door between himself and Simon, throw the bolt, and there’d be no way Simon could get to him.

Easier said than done. Shuffling out of the closet in what he desperately hoped was the direction of the door, Nelson tried to remember whether the dead bolt was set low enough for him to be able to reach it with his hands tied behind him. There wouldn’t be time to fumble around for it in any case, he realized-he’d have to locate, slam, and bolt the door all in one motion if he was to have any hope of keeping Simon on the other side. Which meant he needed to turn around and back toward it.

Again, easier said than done. As Nelson executed a tentative about-face (turn too far or not far enough, he knew, and he’d be wandering around the bedroom, disoriented, until Simon came to fetch him) and began to inch backward toward the door, it occurred to him that at least he had learned the answer to his earlier question: there was indeed a more terrifying, more vulnerable feeling than tottering forward into the darkness.

Nelson’s ciliary radar-the tiny hairs on the back of his arms and neck-whispered a warning just before his bound hands bumped against the back of the bedroom door. It was already closed, he realized, hope surging again-and again, the sensation was nearly indistinguishable from panic. He slid his hands up and down along the crack of the door; at the apex of his reach his fingers brushed the cold iron of the dead-bolt fixture, but the bolt itself was too high for him to grasp. He hunched forward, wrenching his arms higher and higher up his back until his shoulders felt as if they were about to dislocate, until at last he was holding the little round knurl of the bolt between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand.

Working backward with his hands crossed behind him at the wrists was doubly disorienting; with his arms torqued painfully and his shoulders wrenched in their sockets until the shoulder blades felt as if they were sticking out like angel wings, Nelson finally managed to rotate the bolt upward, slide it into its socket, and rotate it down again, then collapsed on the floor, simultaneously exhausted and exhilarated. You did it, he started to tell himself, you-

Then he knew. Nothing had moved in the bedroom, not a scrape, not a rustle, but all the same, he knew. “You’re in here, aren’t you?”

“Oh, yes,” said a voice in the darkness.

Drought be damned, conservation be damned-Dorie wanted a shower, she wanted it hot, hot, hot, and she wanted it to last forever. She stripped off the pink scrubs one of the ER nurses had filched for her, stepped into the shower, and let ’er rip.

It took ten minutes and several relatherings to rid herself of the stink, which was compounded by the reek of Missy’s cheap strawberry-scented bubble bath. Poor Missy, thought Dorie. The nurse had still been performing CPR on her when Dorie and Pender emerged from the basement; by the time the paramedics arrived to take over, Nurse Apple had nearly passed out from hyperventilation, and although the ambulance docs had kept the CPR going all the way to Alta Bates, nobody seemed surprised when she was declared DOA.

It was just as well, though, Dorie decided-from what she had gathered about their relationship, Missy would probably have preferred death to being separated from her big brother for any length of time.

The hot water ran out as Dorie finished rinsing the conditioner out of her hair. She stepped out of the shower, wrapped her hair in a bath-towel turban, dried herself off, dusted herself liberally with L’Air du Temps scented talcum powder-one of her few personal extravagances-and returned to the bedroom to begin a round of musical clothes. Dear Cosmo: What does a gal wear for an informal tete-a-tete with the man who saved her life, whom she might want to get involved with someday, but definitely not tonight, thank you very much, even though she’s already invited him to sleep over?

Then she reminded herself that Pender had already seen her in the buff, under the least flattering conditions imaginable; after those hideous pink scrubs, could it really make any difference what she chose to wear now? She threw on some comfort clothes-roomy fleece sweatpants and an oversize Carmel Padres sweatshirt-and went down to the kitchen, where Pender was on his knees, scrubbing one-handed at the parquet.

“What’d I tell you,” he said, climbing to his feet. His outfit-beret, rumpled polo, and plaid slacks that made his rear end look like a slip-covered sofa-reminded her that clothes really didn’t make the man-or the woman. “Good as new. Didn’t even strip the wax.”

“Pender, you’re a prince.”

“So I’ve been told.”

“Are you hungry?”

“To put it mildly.”

“How do you like your eggs?”

“Sunny side up-like my personality.”

“How ’bout a beer?”

“They say it’s the perfect food.”

“Glass?”

“Naah.”

“Man after my own heart.”

The beer was Tree Frog dark ale, not a brand with which Pender was familiar. The food was perfect, the eggs neither dry nor runny, the bacon neither crisp nor burned. Pender told Dorie she could make breakfast for him whenever she’d a mind to.

“And you can clean my kitchen floor whenever you want.” Dorie took a swig of Tree Frog-out of the bottle, of course. “Where do you think Simon is?”