Jim Shepard - Kiss of the Wolf

“How could he disappear that fast?” she said, coming back down the hall.

She sat at the table, after starting another pot of coffee.

Nancy was the last person she needed to deal with right now. “I’m real busy,” she said.

Nancy looked down.

Come on, Joanie thought. This is your best friend.

“Hey,” she said. “How’re you doin’?”

Nancy leaned forward in her chair and put her elbows on her knees. She gave Joanie a little smile and looked down the hall toward the living room. “You heard anything from Gary?” she asked.

Joanie wanted to help, but she didn’t have time for this. And she was worried about Todd. “Don’t worry about Bruno,” she said. “He’s all talk.”

“I didn’t just bring it up because a Bruno,” Nancy said. “I been thinking about you.”

“Thanks,” Joanie said, but she didn’t sound as touched as she felt.

They both were staring down the cluttered hallway.

“You’re really letting the house go,” Nancy said. She sounded sad rather than judgmental, but Joanie was still a little offended.

Joanie got up and poured their coffee. She pushed the half-and-half closer to Nancy’s cup with two fingers.

“We gonna talk, or what?” Nancy said.

“What’re we doin’ now?” Joanie asked.

Nancy snorted.

They went all the way back to junior high. Joanie remembered a night before a Spring Fling dance, the two of them improvising to disguise the little cycle of good dance clothes they owned.

“The Gary thing got me down, and …” She searched around for something else. She was terrible at this, even when she was telling the truth. “Bruno’s been a pain.”

Nancy looked away.

“I’m sorry,” Joanie said. “You know what I mean.” What she meant was, I’m sorry about the way you feel about Bruno.

Nancy nodded. Joanie thought, This is a woman who never got one break.

She had another memory, from after high school: the two of them showing each other their diaries. She remembered thinking it was their way of proving to themselves that someone in the world might be interested. She remembered Nancy used little symbols, a code for herself. To make it more exciting? To save time? As a kind of modesty? Joanie couldn’t tell. She remembered some of the bigger ones: Three wavy lines meant depression. A skull and crossbones meant sex.

“I put up with so much shit from him,” Nancy said. “Like just now. He has to do that in front of you? He has to ask you out in front of me?”

Joanie gave her a sympathetic look, but she could feel her concentration slipping back to the car in the garage, Todd wandering by a police station.

“I should get one of those books,” Nancy said. “ Women Who Love Guys Who Love … whatever. I went to a bar the other night. Mr. P’s. I called you but you were out. The night a Todd’s party, after we all went home. I just thought, you know, I don’t need anybody to go out with. I took a booth, I’m minding my own business, Bruno comes in with Joey Distefano and two other guys.”

Joanie sat up. “Joey Distefano?” she said.

“The cop,” Nancy said. “You met him. Bruno sees me, you think he comes over? You think he introduces me? He just starts joking.” She was lifting her mug and setting it down with her middle finger and thumb.

“What’d he joke about?” Joanie finally said quietly.

Nancy lowered her head, ashamed, and Joanie felt a pang for asking.

“Like he thought I couldn’t hear him,” Nancy said. She lifted her mug and set it down again. “So I drank three beers so I could make my own jokes,” she said.

From the living room they heard the jingle of Audrey’s tag as she scratched herself and the grunt when she collapsed back onto the carpet.

Joanie touched her hand to Nancy’s upper arm. “Sweetie,” she said.

Nancy stood up. “You know what? I’m gonna let you do whatever you have to do today.”

“You want another cuppa coffee?” Joanie said.

“You’re busy, I’m busy,” Nancy said. “Gimme a call sometime. I gotta roll.” She squeezed Joanie’s shoulder. When she opened the back door, she called, “Audrey. Break-in in progress,” and waved to Joanie before shutting it behind her. Audrey didn’t bark.

She washed out the coffee cups and put them in the dishwasher. It was already eleven-thirty. She made a nice sandwich for Todd, pepperoni and cheese. She cut it in half and sat next to it for a moment, like it was her accomplishment for the day. She covered it with a napkin.

She was all jittery. She had a three-hour wait before she could take the car in. If she left a little early, two and a half hours.

At some point she should eat. She made herself a half sandwich, of provolone only, and fed it to the dog.

She cleared out the hall. She swept upstairs in the spare room and found on the floor a half-filled mug of coffee that had to be a week old.

She called Brendan’s house. Todd hadn’t been there.

Audrey followed her from room to room.

She went out to the garage and squeezed past all the junk up to the front of the car. She studied the dents. She was trying to think of what to claim she hit. First she thought a pole. Then she realized there’d be scrapes, that the paint would look different and the dents would be less gentle. A bush? A deer? Did they even ask when you brought a car in? Still, she had to have something ready, even if they just asked casually. What would she say? None of your business? She got impatient with herself and left the garage.

She wrapped Todd’s sandwich in foil and put it in the refrigerator at the front of the top shelf.

She sat back down at the kitchen table. Did he have any money for lunch?

The phone rang. When she answered, nobody was on the other end.

She thought about how unhappy Nancy was, how little help she’d been. “When was I ever any help?” she said aloud.

Audrey pattered into the kitchen, assuming she was being talked to.

Those things they put near highway exits. Those barrels filled with sand: she could say she hit one of those. She tried to anticipate ways in which someone could figure out she hadn’t.

The kitchen clock made a small clicking noise. She scratched her instep with her heel. Her stomach was churning. On a scratch pad on the table she drew an oval, and put two dots inside it and gave it a smile. She drew a parody of her hair. She wrote JOANIE underneath it and crossed it out with a single huge X.

She went back out to the garage and checked the roof of the car. He’d hit the roof of the car. She got her eyes low to the roofline and saw the dents: wide and shallow, at least two. They were hard to see, maybe because the car was a dark color.

She put her hand on one, like she could still feel body warmth.

There was nothing she could do about those. What was she going to say? She hit one of the barrels and it bounced over her head?

She squatted beneath the junk on the wall. She was never going to be able to relax. The roof was always going to be like this. A year from now she could see Bruno running a hand over it and suddenly looking at her.

She calmed herself down. He hadn’t seen them yesterday. Neither had she.

She went back inside and watched TV, trying to figure out what to do. She was waiting for Todd and two o’clock. “The Andy Griffith Show,” “The Dick Van Dyke Show.” Rob’s boss had a toupee and something funny was going on with their not wanting him to know they knew. Two o’clock came first.

She tore off the top page of the scratch pad. On the page underneath, she wrote, Todd — Back soon — Sandwich in Frige. She swore and jammed in a d, making it Fridge. She added, Want to go to a movie tonight? Love, Mom, and centered the note on the table.