Old Flames by Jack Ketchum
And she could hear it in his voice immediately. She pretended she didn’t.
Hi, Jim. It’s me. I just wanted to let you know I got in all right, and to thank you and…
She listened to him.
Oh no. Oh god, Jim. She what? How could she slip…? Oh my god.
She listened some more.
And the kids? What about the kids, are they…?
Jimmy was already on his way home from camp he said. As yet the boy didn’t know why. He wasn’t about to tell him on the phone. Linda was in her bedroom, clearly distraught. Her best friend Beth was up there with her. He’d go up again himself in a little while.
Listen, I’m going to come right back out there. I’ve got some business to finish up here tomorrow and then I’ll catch the next flight back. This is no time for you guys to be alone. I’ll be on a plane by tomorrow, okay? Tomorrow afternoon. I know that. I want to. Listen to me. I want to, Jim. Karen was…
And what was Karen exactly? She was almost shocked at the very real catch in her throat.
Karen was very good to me. My god I’m so sorry, Jim. Really I am. I’ll see you tomorrow night, all right? You take care of yourself in the meantime, will you? And tell Linda and Jimmy…just tell them hello for me. Send them my love, all right? Can you get some sleep? Try to get some sleep, okay?
He would. He’d try.
Okay. Goodbye, Jim. Goodbye.
And she was surprised once again by the tear that rolled down her cheek and then truly amazed at the sobs which continued on and off through the night.
NINETEEN
Dora, Matthew, and Linda
There was certainly no shortage of mourners. Karen had a lot of friends obviously if only her widowed mother in the way of immediate family. Dora took in the tableau graveside. Jim rigid and pale in the bright California sunshine holding Jimmy’s hand on one side with his arm around Linda’s waist on the other. His father Mr. Weybourne had gone mostly bald and had developed quite a paunch since she’d seen him last and he stood behind them, hands resting lightly on Jimmy’s shoulders. Mrs. Weybourne, whose hair had gone a beautiful silky white and whom time had treated far better than her husband, attended to the frail old shattered woman who was Karen’s mother.
The pastor read from Ecclesiastes. Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern, then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return to God who gave it. Let us pray.
She joined the mourners in the Lord’s Prayer but did not bow her head as did most. Her eyes stayed on Jim. He was saying the prayer too but his shoulders were shaking. Linda glanced up at him. He turned to her with a small sad smile and the shaking slowly subsided.
Matthew’s eyes were on Dora. He’d found himself standing uncomfortably close to her as the group assembled—just behind her and to the right—and by the time he was aware of her there it would have been embarrassing to move away. She looked stunning of course, dressed in elegant black silk.
She was watching Jim with what appeared to be serious concern.
He relaxed slightly. The concern looked real all right. But he still didn’t have to like the woman.
…and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the power and the kingdom and the glory forever…
He followed her gaze and saw Linda press her head against Jim’s chest and begin to cry.
She had always found it strange that at the reception after a funeral people ate as heartily as they did. Was it because a funeral was emotionally exhausting, expending energy that the body then needed to replenish? Or maybe it was simply life reaffirming itself. I eat, therefore I am. Still am.
Whatever the cause the cold cuts were the first to go and as she set a new platter heaped with ham and cheese and roast beef and sliced turkey on the table she saw Linda and Jimmy standing across from her and noted that while Jimmy’s plate was full Linda’s portion seemed merely a token gesture to hunger. She smiled at them. Jimmy returned the smile. Linda didn’t.
Linda practically glared at her.
Now what the hell was that all about?
She watched the girl drift slowly into the living room to join her father and Matthew and some business associates near the front door. The snub was palpable. She felt her cheeks flush and turned to go back into the kitchen with some empty plates, keeping busy her main objective now but Mr. and Mrs. Weybourne seemed to appear out of nowhere in front of her with drinks in hand. His would be scotch, she remembered, hers rye and soda.
“It’s so good of you, dear,” said the woman. Dora thought the single string of pearls quite tasteful. “I’m really very glad that…even under these awful, terrible circumstances…we’ve finally got to see you again.”
“It’s good to see you too, Mrs. Weybourne.”
“We were always hoping, you know, Robert and I…I mean, you were so very close once, you and James…”
“I know.”
She was aware of no other living soul who called him James. Not even his father.
“It’s silly, of course, because you were so very young, but we sort of even thought…”
“I did too, Mrs. Weybourne. I guess we all did. But we were kids, weren’t we.”
Her smile was awkward. “Of course. Yes of course you were. And Karen was so good for James, wasn’t she. So good.”
“Yes. She was. I’m sorry.”
And there was nowhere to go after that for either of them.
“Well thank you, dear. Thank you for being here.”
Mr. Weybourne nodded his agreement. He was never much for words she thought. As an investment banker she guessed he didn’t need to be.
“Least I can do,” she said and headed for the kitchen.
What’s she doing here? Linda thought. The words kept playing over and over in her mind like some stupid tune you hear in your brain early in the morning that stays with you all day long. What’s she doing here? She’s not my mother’s friend. She barely knew her. So what the hell’s she doing here?
It might have helped if Beth and Suzie were still around, if she had somebody to talk to—she might have been able to think about something else but Beth and Suzie were uncomfortable in this situation and she couldn’t blame them, she’d have been uncomfortable too if it had been one of their mothers who had this stupid fucking accident and died. Her father was busy talking with these men from work and Jimmy was no help. Jimmy was a kid.
So she stood there with this stupid plate in her hand. Cantaloupe and honeydew and sliced pineapple and a fat pair of strawberries.
Fuck food. Fuck this. Fuck everything.
She walked back to the table and practically tossed the plate onto it so that the strawberries bounced off onto the tablecloth. She walked back through the crowd and up the stairs to her room.
What’s she doing here?
And Matthew took note of this.
He said nothing to Jim.
Not now.
Dora watched him sip his drink alone and exhausted on the couch. He was not drinking heavily but he was drinking steadily now that the guests were gone. She moved back and forth from the dining room to the kitchen, wrapping meats and cheese and salad, fruits and apple tarts. Finding room for them in the refrigerator. Keeping busy. When she was done she’d start stacking dishes in the dishwasher.
She was good at this. She was very orderly.
“Leave it, Dora,” he said. “Lin and I will handle it later.”
She rinsed her hands and dried them and went into the living room. Sat next to him on the couch.
“I have a better idea. You go up to bed. Take a nap. How much sleep did you get last night?”
“Not much.”
“I want to do this, okay? You take care of your family. That’s all you have to do right now.”
He looked at her, tears welling up in his eyes.
“My family.”
She reached out
“It’s going to be all right.”
“She was just…”
She heard the unspoken finish…the most important thing in my life.
“I know,” she said. “We’ll take care of it, Jim. You’ll see. We’ll heal it. You and the kids and me. We’ll help. You’ll see. But right now you need your sleep. I’ll finish up here in a little while and let myself out, okay?”
She pushed him gently away and stood in front of him and reached for his hand.
“Come on. Let’s get you up to bed. By the time I’m through you won’t even know any of this happened here today.”
I’ll see to it, she thought. I’ll wipe the afternoon clean of everything.
TWENTY
Dora
It took roughly a month and a half for her to become inevitable. That was how she thought of it. Not quite death and taxes but close enough.
She proceeded slowly but soon she was preparing the occasional lunch and dinner. She could cook. She’d always been a decent cook. Chicken almandine and Greek roast pork, chateaubriand and quesadillas. Her soft-shell crabs went over nicely with everybody but Linda—she said they looked alive.
But Dora could feel that even Linda was warming toward her.
Once she’d convinced Jim that it was okay to allow her boyfriend Rick over now and then, under supervision of course—Karen had been dead set against that after the petting-on-the-couch episode—the girl had lightened up on her considerably.
Though the entire family was subject to mood swings.
At his Little League games you could never be sure whether, when Jimmy struck out, which he did with some frequency, he’d retire from the plate peacefully or try to smash a hole in it with his bat. Knowing the circumstances his coach complained to Jim as gently as possible. When Linda was denied a one o’clock curfew for some party or whatever it was teens actually did these days she was as apt to go ballistic as not. Even Jim came home from work exhausted but sunny one day while the next all he did was brood all evening.
She guessed it was natural. She simply soldiered through.
One evening the four of them were sitting in front of the television and Jim switched channels to a TMC broadcast of THE GRADUATE, which the kids had never seen. Jimmy never even made it through the pool scene—Dustin Hoffman hiding underwater. That’s not funny. I don’t see why that’s so funny he said and stalked off to his bedroom.
Nobody used the pool anymore. Not even Dora could bear it. A drink outside on the terrace in the sun now and then and that was that. The pool man came to clean it every two weeks.
It was her own imagination she was sure because it was long gone by now but he always seemed to step over or around where the stain had been.
TWENTY-ONE
Linda
Both Beth and Suzie thought it was high time she talked to her brother Jimmy about it and she figured that they were probably right. So that night when she heard the toilet flush she opened the door and stood in the doorway and waited until he padded out into the hall in his pajama bottoms.
“Hey. C’mere,” she said.
“Huh?”
“Come on in here.”
“What? Into your room?”
“That’s right.”
He smiled. “You want me to come into your room?”
“Jimmy, that’s what I said, isn’t it?”
He shrugged. She stepped aside and then closed the door behind him.
“Sit.”
“Where? Here? On the bed?”
“Of course on the bed, dope.”
He looked at her like he was expecting some kind of trick. Like she couldn’t be serious. Then sat down on the edge of the bed. She sat down beside him a comfortable few feet away.
“Okay. So what do you think of her?”
“Her? Oh. You mean Dora?”
“Uh-huh. Dora.”
He shrugged again. “I like her.”
“You do.”
“I guess. Why?”
“You don’t think she’s going all mom on us here?”
“That’s dopey. She’s Dora. She’s not mom. Jeez.”
“Those high-tops you had on today. Who bought them for you?”
“She did.”
“Who bought you the Shadow Ops: Red Mercury?”
“Dora did. She got it on eBay. Said it was cheap. So what? Who bought you the new iPod?”
“I’m not accusing you of anything for chrissake, Jimmy. Yes, Dora bought it for me. You see what I mean? Dora did. Not dad.”
“Dad almost never buys us stuff. You know that. Just Christmas and birthdays. Right?”
“Right. Mom always did. Now do you get what I’m saying here, Mr. Thickskull?”
He considered it.
“You mean she’s acting like mom did.”
“Exactly.”
“You really think?”
“I think.”
She could see something working on him inside. Finally he shook his head.
“No,” he said. “No. That’s not true! Mom didn’t used to just…give us stuff!”
He jumped off the bed. Turned to her. Angry and all of a sudden very close to tears.
“Mom used to…mom always used to…!”
And she truly felt him then. A little kid’s lonely anguish. Maybe for the first time ever.
She held out her arms.
“Hey, kid…c’mere…”
“You’re wrong! You don’t know anything! You’re wrong, dammit!”
He flung open the door and ran out into the hall and left her there, heart thudding in her chest by now, hurting for him and for herself too if the truth be known, for the huge empty hole in their lives. She heard his own door slam. Which clearly meant don’t follow. She wouldn’t.
Well, that went well, she thought. Thanks, girls.
But it wasn’t Beth and Suzie she was really angry with. It was herself. And somehow Dora.
TWENTY-TWO
Jim, Dora, and Matthew
It was a welcome break from the stack of files on his desk but she had never visited him at the office either. So he had to wonder what was up. And when June let her in and closed the door behind her and he looked at her standing there tense and unmoving he knew that something definitely was. His smile didn’t manage to elicit any in return. Nor his offer of a cup of coffee. No thanks.
“I just came by for a moment,” she said. “Could we have some privacy?”
“Sure.”
He told June to hold his calls.
“So,” he said. “Have a seat, Dora. Relax.”
He sat but she didn’t. Instead she walked past his desk to the picture window behind him so he had to swivel around to see her. She was frowning, staring out the window. Practically wringing her hands, he thought. What the hell?
“I’ve been having some trouble,” she said. “I think maybe I ought to go home for a while. Maybe for a long while.”
He waited for more but evidently more wasn’t forthcoming.
“I don’t get it. Why? I guess I mean, why now?”
“Well, there’s the business for one thing.”
“I thought your partner was handling the business. What’s her name?”
“Barbara. Yes, of course she is, but…god, Jim. It’s not about that. Not really.”
“Well what then?”
But he already had a pretty good idea what it was about. He felt a strange mix of sensations. Relief that the cat was finally going to come leaping out of the bag. Dread as to how to handle it once it landed smack at his feet.
“It’s us. You and me. Damn it. It’s about my wanting you and not feeling right about wanting you. Feeling horrible sometimes about wanting you.”
She turned to face him.
“We said in my room that night that it had to be the last time. Remember? Because of Karen. But it’s not the same anymore, is it. Because…my god! I don’t know how to say
And he knew what the answer to that one was. There was just no way in hell he could say it to her.
“Do you?” she said softly.
She waited, reached up for the top button of her blouse and then the next and yet a third and he thought no dear god woman what the hell are you doing and for the first time in memory he could actually hear the air-conditioning unit because the silence in the room was so fundamental and then could hear the blouse whisper along her arms down to the floor.
She stood before him naked to the waist and watched his face seem to crack suddenly and then he lunged for her, pushing her back onto the windowsill, his cock already hard against her and his mouth on her own. His hands jittered feverishly along her back and then her breasts and as she unzipped him and freed him he clawed her panties down her legs and shoved himself inside her.
You don’t go, he said. You stay, you hear me? I’m fucking you. I’m fucking you! You don’t go anywhere!
He pulled out of her and turned her and she pressed her hands splayed against the cool windowsill and raised her ass for him as he lifted her skirt and then he was inside her again and she heard him moan and his thighs slap against her ass and she had the briefest memory of Owen slapping against her too but this was not Owen’s bed, this was an office that looked down on the broad sunny boulevard below.
She gazed at the people on the street and the cars across the street in the lot where she’d first seen him again after twenty years and then her eyes focused on her own reflection in the window. She saw Jim’s hands clutch her breasts and the sheen of sweat gleam between them and then glanced up at her face and held there. She saw will and a kind of triumph on that face but this was not a person she knew exactly.
A trick of the glass she thought. An abstraction.
One he shouldn’t see.