Rye Curtis - Kingdomtide

Jill finished the cigarette and flicked the butt over the deck railing. She stripped to her brassiere and underwear and slid in. She held above the water her bandaged hand.

Lewis sucked at the last drop of merlot in the bottom of her glass, then set it aside. The flashlights moved in the trees and she brought up a hand to the air and watched her fingers steam. I don’t figure I’ve ever had an orgasm.

The girl said nothing for a moment and then said, How do you know?

I expect I don’t.

Me neither.

My guess is that means we never had one, Lewis said, and she took up the empty glass and tried to drink from it.

Bloor, in the kitchen washing dishes, watched them from the window.

Some women have them, Lewis said. I know that. You see it in the goddamn movies. A girl I knew in high school swore she had them with a trombonist named Hamin. Goddamn embouchure. But I can’t do it. No matter how hard I try.

Maybe no woman has. Maybe it’s a conspiracy to keep us having sex.

Your dad really doesn’t give you enough credit, Lewis said. I figure it’s just cause I don’t get caught up in the moment. I can’t even watch a goddamn movie without I keep an eye out for the camera in mirrors. I can’t just enjoy somethin for what it’s wantin to be.

Me neither.

I figure everyone else can get caught up just fine. Must be what you need to do to get along with all the goddamn people. Maybe it’s even what you need to love them.

There’s more to it than that, I think.

On the rare occasion I do get caught up I get carried away, Lewis said. I do somethin out of hand. I let it all get out of hand.

Is that why you’re naked?

Probably. It’s hard to know why we do what we do.

I get carried away too.

I expect I’ve had too much merlot.

It’s fine, the girl said.

Maybe it’s a good thing we came across each other.

Do you care about me?

I expect I do.

Do you think you’ll ever learn how to get caught up when you want to get caught up?

Lewis shook her head. Too goddamn old already for that. But you still got a chance. Then she leaned over and vomited on the deck.

Lewis was on the upstairs terrace. She stood at the railing in the shadows and watched Jill in the hot tub below. The girl sat yet in the water, small and pale behind the steam, and stared off beyond the deck and the dead skunk, sparking cigarette after cigarette. The flashlights had shone for hours in the trees behind the cabin and now they scanned in the direction of the road.

Bloor came through the sliding glass door and joined Lewis on the terrace. He held out before him his chalked hands. He turned them front to back and studied them under the moon. The motion light was off. Are you going back out there to that shelter tomorrow?

Lewis nodded. The FBI are sendin a chopper.

It’s funny how when you look for one thing you find another, Bloor said.

We didn’t find anythin. All they told Gaskell was they wanted me to show them the shelter. I’ll clean off your deck tomorrow. Sorry about that.

I was talking about us.

What about us?

You know, you’re a fascinating woman, Ranger Lewis. I came up here to find a downed plane and I found you. Don’t you want to come in? It’s cold.

Not yet.

Bloor rubbed his hands together and breathed on them. Tomorrow, he said, tell them to look under the floor. Koojee. You could’ve been sleeping right on top of that missing girl.

It wasn’t the girl.

Bloor shook his head. You know, my wife always told me everyone’s a wasp in a curtain, panicking to get out of something they can’t hope to ever understand because it’s too far beyond their realm of comprehension.

Lewis watched Jill and the smoke she made.

A wasp doesn’t know what a curtain is, Bloor said.

All right, goddamn it.

And she always told me to get what I could get while the getting was good.

Lots of goddamn people say that one.

Bloor smiled. Not the way she said it. He took Lewis by the shoulders and kissed her. What would you like me to do for you? he said.

Sorry?

What do you want to do?

Whatever.

Bloor leaned on the railing and looked down. Lewis figured he watched his daughter below. He had a small erection between the slats of the railing. He turned to Lewis and brought his eyes to hers and exhaled. I love you, Ranger Lewis, he said.

Lewis waited before dawn at the airfield down the mountain. She drank a cup of coffee in the Wagoneer and filled the thermos from a bottle of merlot. She watched the highway.

It was 5:16 a.m. by the dashboard clock when a black sedan pulled up with three men in windbreakers. Lewis licked a flattened palm and smoothed her hair. She put on the campaign hat and got out of the Wagoneer into the cold. A mustached man shorter than the other two cradled an arm in a sling and introduced himself as Special Agent Polite. He introduced the others as his colleagues, Jameson and Yip. They did not speak except to nod and mutter, their faces like those of sullen children, turned away to the mountains.

The group boarded a helicopter and flew out to a clearing near the Old Pass and followed Lewis into the forest. They found the shelter as the sun came up. Jameson and Yip drew their sidearms and Yip pushed open the door and went in slow. Polite followed, his hand under his windbreaker on the butt of a pistol.

Lewis drew the revolver from her hip and went in after the men. The shelter was as she recalled leaving it. The striped socks yet hung from the clothesline. The spiral she had drawn in dust was still on the table.

These the socks in your report? Polite said.

Yes.

One of the men raised a camera from around his neck and photographed the socks. The flash wheezed and he went to the table and photographed the spiral.

Is this how you found it?

Yes. But I made that.

Why?

I don’t know. You ever do somethin you don’t know why you’re doin it?

Polite looked at her. Anything different since you left it?

I don’t think so.

Take a good look.

It’s the same.

Polite walked around the place and stood near the pair of socks. He looked down at the book on the table and read aloud: The Joy of Lesbian Sex: A Tender and Liberated Guide to the Pleasures and Problems of a Lesbian Lifestyle by Dr. Emily L. Sisley and Bertha Harris. I think this is a dead end. Unlikely he would be this far out. This appears to be the work of alternatively inspired people.

It’s Cloris.

What is Cloris?

Cloris Waldrip survived a plane crash not far from here about five weeks ago, Lewis said. She holstered the revolver.

What kind of name is Cloris? Dutch? Irish?

I’m not sure.

Sounds Irish.

I just don’t know.

How do you know she survived, Ranger Lewis? Where is she?

She’s lost. She carved her name into a goddamn stump twelve miles west of here.

A stump?

Yes.

Cloris?

Yes.

Well, maybe she did stay here, Polite said. He was surveying the room. He passed his good hand over his mustache. She’s not here now. I can’t see much here that interests my investigation as of yet. Jameson, make another picture of these socks.

Yessir. Should we bag them?

I don’t see why we would. Did your Cloris Waldrip wear socks like that, Ranger Lewis?

I don’t know. I don’t figure her for wearin socks like that, no.

Did she read literature on alternative lifestyles?

I don’t know. I don’t expect she would.

Well then, I guess this is a dead end for the both of us.

There’s blood on the floor, sir, Yip said, and he took a photograph of the floor.

That’s from a member of my team, Lewis said. She injured her goddamn hand when we were here last Tuesday.