Joe Hill - Heart-Shaped Box

Georgia said, “Tell me about this woman who sent you the ghost.”

“Jessica Price. She didn’t just send him to me either. Remember, she tricked me into paying for him.”

“Right. On eBay or something?”

“No. A different site, a third-rate clone. And it only looked like a regular Internet auction. She was orchestrating things from behind the scenes to make sure I’d win.” Jude saw the question forming in Georgia’s eyes and answered it before she could speak. “Why she went to all that trouble I can’t tell you. I get the feeling, though, that she couldn’t just mail him to me. I had to agree to take possession of him. I’m sure there’s some profound moral message in that.”

“Yeah,” Georgia said. “Stick with eBay. Accept no substitutes.” She tasted some wine, licked her lips, then went on. “And this is all because her sister killed herself? Why does she think that’s your fault? Is it because of something you wrote in one of your songs? Is this like when that kid killed himself after listening to Ozzy Osbourne? Have you written anything that says suicide is okay or something?”

“No. Neither did Ozzy.”

“Then I don’t see why she’s so pissed off at you. Did you know each other in some way? Did you know the girl who killed herself? Did she write you crazy fan letters or something?”

He said, “She lived with me for a while. Like you.”

“Like me? Oh.”

“Got news for you, Georgia. I wasn’t a virgin when I met you.” His voice sounded wooden and strange to him.

“How long did she live here?”

“I don’t know. Eight, nine months. Long enough to overstay her welcome.”

She thought about that. “I’ve been living with you for about nine months.”

“So?”

“So have I overstayed mine? Is nine months the limit? Then it’s time for some fresh pussy? What, was she a natural blonde, and you decided it was time for a brunette?”

He took his hands off his guitar. “She was a natural psycho, so I threw her ass out. I guess she didn’t take it well.”

“What do you mean, she was a psycho?”

“I mean manic-depressive. When she was manic, she was a hell of a lay. When she was depressive, it was a little too much work.”

“She had mental problems, and you just chucked her out?”

“I didn’t sign on to hold her hand the rest of her life. I didn’t sign on to hold yours either. I’ll tell you something else, Georgia. If you think our story ends ‘and they lived happily ever after,’ then you’ve got the wrong fuckin’ fairy tale.” As he spoke, he became aware that he’d found his chance to hurt her and get rid of her. He had, he understood now, been steering the conversation toward this very moment. The idea recurred that if he could sting her badly enough to make her leave—even if it was just for a while, a night, a few hours—it might be the last good thing he ever did for her.

“What was her name? The girl who killed herself?”

He started to say “Anna,” then said “Florida” instead.

Georgia stood quickly, so quickly she tottered, looked as if she might fall over. He could’ve reached out to steady her but didn’t. Better to let her hurt. Her face whitened, and she took an unsteady half step back. She stared at him, bewildered and wounded—and then her eyes sharpened, as if she were suddenly bringing his face into focus.

“No,” she breathed softly. “You’re not going to drive me away like that. You say any shitty thing you want. I’m sticking, Jude.”

She carefully set the glass she was holding on the edge of his desk. She started away from him, then paused at the door. She turned her head but didn’t quite seem able to look into his face.

“I’m going to get some sleep. You come on to bed, too.” Telling him, not asking.

Jude opened his mouth to reply and found he had nothing to say. When she left the room, he gently leaned his guitar against the wall and stood up. His pulse was jacked, and his legs were unsteady, the physical manifestations of an emotion it took him some time to place—he was that unused to the sensation of relief.

17

Georgia was gone.That was the first thing he knew. She was gone, and it was still night. He exhaled, and his breath made a cloud of white smoke in the room. He shoved off the one thin sheet and got out of bed, then hugged himself through a brief shivering fit.

The idea that she was up and wandering the house alarmed him. His head was still muddy with sleep, and it had to be close to freezing in the room. It would’ve been reasonable to think Georgia had gone to figure out what was wrong with the heat, but Jude knew that wasn’t it. She’d been sleeping badly as well, tossing and muttering. She might have come awake and gone to watch TV—but he didn’t believe that either.

He almost shouted her name, then thought better of it. He quailed at the idea that she might not reply, that his voice might be met with a ringing silence. No. No yelling. No rushing around. He felt if he went slamming out of the bedroom and rushing through the unlit house, calling for her, it would tip him irrevocably toward panic. Also, the darkness and quiet of the bedroom appalled him, and he understood that he was afraid to go looking for her, afraid of what might be waiting beyond the door.

As he stood there, he became aware of a guttural rumble, the sound of an idling engine. He rolled his eyes back, looked at the ceiling. It was lit an icy white, someone’s headlights, pointing in from the driveway below. He could hear the dogs barking.

Jude crossed to the window and shifted aside the curtain.

The pickup parked out front had been blue once, but it was at least twenty years old and had not seen another coat in all that time, had faded to the color of smoke. It was a Chevy, a working truck. Jude had whiled away two years of his life twisting a wrench in an auto garage for $1.75 an hour, and he knew from the deep, ferocious mutter of the idling engine that it had a big block under the hood. The front end was all aggression and menace, with a wide silver bumper like a boxer’s mouthpiece and an iron brush guard bolted over the grill. What he had taken at first for headlights were a pair of floods attached to the brush guard, two round spots pouring their glare into the night. The pickup sat almost a full foot off the ground on four 35s, a truck built for running on washed-out swamp roads, banging through the ruts and choking brush of the Deep South, the bottoms. The engine was running. No one was in it.

The dogs flung themselves against the chain-link wall of the pen, a steady crash and clang, yapping at the empty pickup. Jude peered down the driveway, in the direction of the road. The gates were closed. You had to know a six-digit security code to get them open.

It was the dead man’s truck. Jude knew the moment he saw it, knew with a calm, utter certainty. His next thought was, Where we going, old man?

The phone by the bed chirped, and Jude half jumped in surprise, letting go of the curtain. He turned and stared. The clock beside the phone read 3:12. The phone rang again.

Jude moved toward it, tiptoeing quickly across cold floorboards. Stared down at it. It rang a third time. He didn’t want to answer. He had an idea it would be the dead man, and Jude didn’t want to talk to him. Jude didn’t want to hear Craddock’s voice.

“Fuck it,” he said, and he answered. “Who is it?”

“Hey, Chief. It’s Dan.”

“Danny? It’s three in the morning.”

“Oh. I didn’t know it was so late. Were you asleep?”

“No.” Jude fell silent, waited.

“I’m sorry I left like I did.”

“Are you drunk?” Jude asked. He looked at the window again, the blue-tinted glare of the floodlights shining around the edges of the curtains. “Are you calling drunk because you want your job back? Because if you are, this is the wrong fuckin’ time—”