Lisey's Story(45)

"Yeah, that." Now she says it. "Lisa Landon." Like the eggs, it tastes good.

"Little Lisey Landon," he says, and flips his egg in the air. It turns over twice and lands square in the bacon-grease, splat.

"Do you, Scott Landon, promise to strap it on and keep the mothersmucker strapped?"

she asks.

"Strapped in sickness, strapped in health," he agrees, and they begin laughing like mad bastards while the radio plays in the sunshine.

22

With Scott, she always laughed a lot. And a week later the cuts on his hand, even the one on his forearm, were pretty much healed.

They didn't even scar.

23

When Lisey wakes again, she no longer knew when she was - then or now. But enough of morning's first light had crept into the room so she can see the cool blue wallpaper and the seascape on the wall. So it was Amanda's bedroom, and that seemed right, but it also seems wrong; it seems to her that this is a dream of the future she's having in her narrow apartment bed, the one she still shares with Scott on most nights, and will until the wedding in November.

What wakened her?

Amanda was turned away from her and Lisey was still fitted against her like a spoon, her br**sts against Manda's back, her belly against Manda's scant bottom, and just what has wakened her? She doesn't need to pee...not badly, anyway, so what...?

Amanda, did you say something? Do you want something? Drink of water, maybe?

Piece of greenhouse glass to slit your wrists with?

These things passed through her mind, but Lisey didn't really want to say anything, because an odd idea has come to her. The idea is that, although she can see the rapidly graying mop of Amanda's hair and the frill around the neck of Amanda's nightgown, she was actually in bed with Scott. Yes! That at some point in the night Scott has...what?

Crept through the lens of Lisey's memories and into Amanda's body? Something like that. It's a funny idea, all right, and yet she doesn't want to say anything, because she's afraid that if she did, Amanda might answer in Scott's voice. And what would she do then? Would she scream? Would she scream to wake the dead, as the saying is? Surely the idea is absurd, but -

But look at her. Look how she's sleeping, with her knees pulled up and her head bent. If there was a wall, her forehead would be touching it. No wonder you think -

And then, in that pre-dawn ditch of five o'clock, with her face turned away so Lisey cannot see it, Amanda spoke.

"Baby," she says.

There is a pause.

Then: "Babyluv."

If Lisey's interior temperature seemed to drop thirty degrees the evening before, now it seems to drop sixty, for although the voice which spoke the word was undeniably female, it is also Scott's. Lisey lived with him for over twenty years. She knows Scott when she hears him.

This is a dream, she told herself. That's why I can't even tell if it's then or now. If I look around I'll see the PILLSBURY'S BEST magic carpet floating in the corner of the room.

But she couldn't look around. For a long time she couldn't move at all. What finally impels her to speak is the strengthening light. Night is almost over. If Scott has come back - if she was really awake and not just dreaming this - then there must be a reason. And it wouldn't be to harm her. Never to harm her. At least...not on purpose. But she finds she can speak neither his name nor Amanda's. Neither seems right. Both seemed wrong. She saw herself grabbing Amanda's shoulder and rolling her over. Whose face would she see under Manda's graying bangs? Suppose it was Scott's? Oh sweet God, suppose.

Daylight is coming. And she was suddenly sure that if she let the sun come up without speaking, the door between the past and the present will close and any chance of getting answers will be gone.

Never mind the names, then. Never mind just who the hell is inside the nightgown.

"Why did Amanda say bool?" she asked. Her voice in the bedroom - still dim but brightening, brightening - sounds hoarse, dusty.

"I left you a bool," remarks the other person in the bed, the person against whose bottom Lisey's belly lies.

Oh God oh God oh God this is the bad-gunky if there ever was bad-gunky, this is it -

And then: Get hold of yourself. You strap it the f**k on. Do it right now.

"Is it..." Her voice was drier and dustier than ever. And now the room seems to be brightening too fast. The sun will clear the eastern horizon any second now. "Is it a blood-bool?"

"You have a blood-bool coming," the voice tells her, sounding faintly regretful. And oh it sounds so much like Scott. Yet now it sounded more like Amanda, too, and this scared Lisey more than ever.

Then the voice brightened. "The one you're on is a good bool, Lisey. It goes behind the purple. You've already found the first three stations. A few more and you'll get your prize."

"What's my prize?" she asks.

"A drink." The reply was prompt.

"A Coke? An RC?"

"Be quiet. We want to watch the hollyhocks."

The voice spoke with strange and infinite longing, and what is familiar about that? Why does it seem like a name for something instead of just bushes? Is it another thing that's hidden behind the purple curtain which sometimes keeps her own memories away from her? There was no time to think about it, let alone ask about it, because a slant of red light fingered in through the window. Lisey felt time come back into focus, and, frightened as she had been, she felt an intense pang of regret.