T. Boyle - Talk Talk

More mumbling. Something about Hertz in Wappingers.

“But they're closed at this hour, right? On a Saturday?”

“I don't know.” An elaborate shrug, the eyes ducking away. “I guess.”

The door of the tavern swung open then, a rectangle of light with two people in the center of it, a couple holding on to each other as if they were wading into the surf at Coney Island, and Peck ended the discussion by easing round the hood of the car and sliding into the seat next to the driver. The people at the door-they were twenty feet away, sallow-faced, drunk-made a move toward the cab, but Peck just gave the kid a look to focus him, to let him know what was going down here, and then he said, “Hit it,” and the cab pulled away from the curb with an apologetic little chirp of the rear wheels.

The girl at the desk ran his platinum Visa card without even looking up and he showed her his California driver's license decorated with his own smiling photograph and M. M. Mako's name and address, and filled out the rental agreement. He chose a black GMC Yukon because the seats folded down and he was thinking he might wind up sleeping in it-there were dirt roads up in the hills in back of Beacon that might as well have been in Alaska for all the traffic they took and nobody would bother him there-and when the girl asked him if he wanted the supplemental collision insurance, a by-the-book standard rip-off, he just smiled and said, “Sure.” Then he went to a diner and had a Greek salad and two burgers, alternately thumbing through one of those freebie real estate magazines and watching himself chew in the reflection of the darkened window. His face floated there in the void, disembodied, a handsome face, a face that could have belonged to anybody, and he chewed and watched himself and let the tension drain out of his eyes. All things considered, he didn't look too bad, the cut drawn pink and thin at the edge of his cheekbone and fading into the sideburn there-for all anyone knew it might have been a scratch he'd got while picking raspberries in the woods or playing with his cat. Or his girlfriend's cat.

The thought of her started up the whole process all over again, one thought butting up against the next till the momentary calm the food had given him burned off like vapor and he had to stand up, throw a bill on the table and stalk out the door without bothering with his change. Cash he had-he always carried a thousand in hundreds, against the unforeseen and unfortunate, against moments like this, like this godforsaken interlude in a parking lot in New Windsor, New York, under a sky that was black to the molars of the universe and no forgiveness anywhere-but it would begin to be a problem in a few days, because he couldn't risk going into a bank for a cash advance, but that wasn't his immediate worry. His immediate worry, he realized, as he started up the car and put it in gear, was Sandman. He had to call Sandman and warn him about what was coming down, and the thought of that made his stomach churn. It wasn't so much that Sandman was going to be upset in a major-league way about the risk he'd put them both in and the hundreds of thousands of dollars he'd just extracted from their mutual pockets because he'd given in to the impulse to run down that bitch and everything was unraveling like a big ball of concertina wire, but that he'd have to admit to it in the first place. He'd have to squirm and he didn't like squirming. He'd have to breathe into the phone and tell Sandman how weak and stupid and shortsighted and amateurish he'd been and then he'd have to say goodbye, permanently, to maybe the only friend he had left in the world.

Yes. And he actually had the cell out, looking to punch in the number as he cruised down the dark street toward the highway and the bridge back across the river, when he stopped himself. He heard his own voice playing in his head-“Hey, Geoff, it's me. Hey, I fucked up. Don't. Don't say anything because I just got to warn you”-but then he folded up the phone and slipped it back in his pocket. He would call him later. Once he got where he was going-but where was that?

Without even realizing what he was doing, he'd turned south on Route 9 once he crossed the river, idly punching through the stations on the radio while the trees rose up on either side of the road in a vast black continuum broken only by the occasional gap where there was a restaurant or gas station or a business with its lights muted and parking lot empty. He'd passed North Highland some time back, a line of cars behind him, headlights coming at him in intervals, and he was in no hurry, floating there in the dash-lit cabin as if that was all that was expected of him. When he came to the places where the road opened up to an extra lane he hugged the dark shoulder and let the whole line of them pass. The musical selection wasn't much-oldies, mainly-but he found a station playing reggae, a Black Uhuru tune followed by Burning Spear and then, who else but Marley? His spirits lifted. He felt almost human. And when he spotted a deli open alongside the road he swung into the lot and went in and bought a bag of barbecue chips and a six-pack.

He had no intention whatever of going anywhere near the house, but when he came to the turnoff that would take him down to 9D and the run along the river from Cold Spring to Garrison, he found himself flicking the right-hand turn signal and then he was in the deeper precincts of the continuous forest, the blacker road, the less-traveled path, listening to reggae till the station faded out and tipping back his second beer. And then he was sweeping past the old church and the cemetery with its ancient stone markers, everything quiet, under wraps, the moon showing now over the trees, quarter of eleven on Saturday night and only the occasional car running toward him and shuddering on by. It was quiet out here, which was why he'd chosen the area in the first place, and he slowed to just under the speed limit and rolled down the window to feel the glutinous air on his face and come alive to the roar of the insects. When the headlights picked out the black sheen of his mailbox and the flitting sparkle of the gravel drive, he felt a sensation of loss so immediate and immitigable it was like a physical blow that reverberated from his brain on down through his torso to his legs and the foot that hit the brake and brought the car to a near standstill before he came to his senses and speeded up again even as a car swung out behind him with a tap of the horn and shot on past.

What was he doing? He didn't know. But he pulled in at the next road, a driveway servicing half a dozen houses that showed now only as vague scatterings of light through the black-hung trees, and he swung up on the shoulder and cut the engine. He fought the impulse to crack another beer-beer, he didn't even like the taste of it, and it bloated you, slowed you down-and pulled out his cell. For a moment he thought he was going to call Sandman, but then he thought he wouldn't. Maybe he wouldn't call at all. Maybe he'd just let it go. Vanish. Fuck everybody. It wasn't his fault that this woman-this deaf woman, this freak-was like a bloodhound. That was one in a thousand, one in a million. All right. Fine. He was sitting in the dark a quarter mile from his own house, feeling the effects of two beers and refusing himself the third, his fingers grainy with the residue of the potato chips, every flag waving and every buzzer going off in his head-“Get out, get out now!”-and so what he did was hit Natalia's number for the hundredth time that night.

The insects roared. The moon cut through the trees like a laser and sliced the hood of the car in two. And suddenly her voice was there with him, the sweet bitten breathy words: “This is Natalia, I am not here now, please. Leave a message. Once the beep.” The rage came up then, a violent impulsive hot cautery of rage burning through him till it was all he could do to keep from pounding the phone against the dash till there was nothing left. He was breathing hard. His eyes felt like they were about to crystallize. And then, as if it were foreordained, as if it were what he'd come to do all along, he cracked the door of the car, eased out into the night, and started through the trees for the house.