The Cemetery Man and Other Darkside Tales

Just Looking

He hadn’t had a woman in so long, he’d started carrying a picture of his right hand around in his wallet.

Everybody he told that to, the guys he worked with at Mossman Hardware, his buddies at the Starlite Tavern, thought it was a pretty funny line. He laughed right along with them. But at night, alone in his two-room apartment, he didn’t think it was so funny anymore. Thing was, it was the plain damn truth. He’d only had a couple of women in his entire life — thirty-four years old and been laid just twice, both of those times with hookers, last time had been over eight years ago. He was just too embarrassed to get undressed in front of some hard-shell whore in a lighted room, have her look at him naked and see the contempt and laughter in her eyes. Too painful, man.

The way he figured it now, he’d never have sex again unless he paid for it. Never get married, never have the kind of relationship other guys had with a woman. He was too butt-ugly. No getting away from that — he had mirrors in his apartment, he saw his reflection in store windows, he knew what he looked like. Big puffy body on little stubby legs, not much chin, mouth like a razor slash, knobby head with a patch of hair like moss growing on a tree stump. Somebody’d said that to him once, in the Starlite or someplace. “You know something, man? You got a head looks like moss growing on a fuckin’ tree stump.”

Most of the time it didn’t bother him too much, being a toad and not having a woman. Most of the time he was a pretty happy guy. He liked his job at Mossman Hardware, he liked drinking and shooting pool with his buddies, he liked baseball (even if some of the players nowadays with their billion-dollar contracts were assholes), he liked bowling at Freedom Lanes and playing draw poker at Henson’s Card Room and watching martial arts flicks on the tube and now and then reading a Louis L’Amour western if he was in the mood for a good book. And when he got horny, well, he had his collection of porn videos and he could go on the Net and surf through the porn sites. Looking was the next best thing to having, right? Just looking could be pretty damn good.

But sometimes, some nights, not having a woman really bothered him. Some nights he felt like busting down and bawling. Life sucked sometimes. When you had a face and a body like his, when you looked like you’d been whupped with an ugly stick, life really sucked sometimes.

He figured things would go on pretty much as they always had, the good and the bad, right up until he croaked. One day the same as another. Weekdays he went to work at the hardware store, knocked off at six, headed to the Starlite or Freedom Lanes or Henson’s, went home and watched a video or fooled around online and then went to bed. Weekends he took in a ballgame, holed up in the Starlite, played poker, played pool, played with his computer, played with himself. Boring, sure, but he was used to it and mostly it suited him. He was better off than a lot of poor jobless schmucks living on the streets or on welfare or hooked on drugs, wasn’t he?

Yeah. Sure he was.

Only then, all at once, everything changed.

Then he met Julie Brock.

Well, he didn’t really meet her. More like he ran into her, almost. It was on a Saturday morning and he was in Safeway buying a couple of six-packs and some TV dinners and other stuff.

He pushed his cart around into the frozen food aisle, and there she was, not two feet away, so that he had to veer off to avoid slamming his cart into hers. As soon as he got a good look at her, it was like he’d been punched in the belly. He couldn’t catch his breath, couldn’t stop staring. He must’ve looked like one of those cartoon characters, Wile E. Coyote or Bugs Bunny, when they got surprised — tongue hanging loose, eyes bugged out so far it was like they were on the end of stalks.

She was a blonde. Not your ordinary blonde, not your Marilyn Monroe type. Sort of a tawny blonde, dark and light at the same time, he’d never seen a color like it. And tall, real tall, almost six feet, with perfect bare legs that went up and up and up. Nice little rack, nice tight ass. Oh, she was gorgeous, man, the sweetest piece of sweetmeat he’d ever feasted his eyes on. She knew it, too. Walked slow and lazy, like a cat, her head up and her nose up. Haughty. Sweet and haughty and twice as sexy in a pair of shorts and a blouse as any of the naked broads on the Net or humping in one of his porn flicks.

She didn’t pay any attention to him, didn’t even glance at him. She stopped pushing her cart and opened a freezer case and bent over to get something off one of the lower shelves so he had an even better view of her ass. He stood there staring until she moved on. Then he started pushing his cart after her. He couldn’t stop looking, he couldn’t just let her go away. He felt like he’d died and gone to heaven. He felt like... he didn’t know what he felt like, except that he was all hot and cold inside and his johnson was half standing at attention in his shorts.

He followed her around the store, not real close so’s she or anybody else would notice. He got in the same checkout line she did. He trailed her out to the parking lot, to a little red Miata. His own beat-up wheels were in the next row. He hustled over there and threw his bags in the backseat, and when she pulled out of the lot he was right behind her.

This is crazy, he thought after a few blocks. Me following a woman around, any woman, let alone a stone fox like her. But what the hell, it wasn’t like he was a pervert or anything. He didn’t mean her any harm. All he was doing was looking.

So he kept on following her, all the way home. And it turned out she lived in a bungalow on Acacia Street, five blocks from his apartment. He parked across the street and watched her carry her groceries inside, and he had a big urge to go over there, offer to help so he could see her again up close. But he didn’t give in to it because he knew what’d happen if he did. She’d take one look at him and tell him to bugger off. She probably had a dozen handsome guys sniffing after her every day, she might even be married or living with somebody. She wouldn’t want anything to do with a butt-ugly toad with a head that looked like moss growing on a fuckin’ tree stump.

She took the last grocery bag into the bungalow and didn’t come out again. He stayed put for a while, but he couldn’t keep on sitting there all day waiting for another look. That was just plain stupid. So he drove on to his apartment and put his groceries away and sat down in his recliner. He’d planned to go to a ballgame today, Giants were playing the Dodgers, but now he didn’t feel like it. Didn’t feel like bowling or going to the Starlite or doing anything else he liked to do on Saturdays.

He couldn’t stop thinking about the blonde. It was like she was lodged inside his head, big as life, that tawny light-and-dark hair and that gorgeous face and that hard body.

Oh, that fine, hard body!

Sunday morning he drove over to Acacia Street again. He’d dreamed about her that night, damn near a wet dream, and woke up with her, and wanted to see her again in the flesh so bad he couldn’t think about anything else.

Damn, though — her Miata wasn’t in the driveway. He parked and waited a half hour or so, but she didn’t come home. He got tired of just sitting and walked over in front of her place, casual, like a guy out for a Sunday stroll. Her bungalow was small, painted a bright blue with white trim, trees and bushes growing thick along both sides. When he squinted down the driveway he could see a jungly backyard, too — part of a lawn, more trees, some tall oleanders. He knew this neighborhood almost as well as his own and he was pretty sure the yard butted up close to Miller Creek.

Back in his car, he drove around the block. Two blocks, matter of fact, because what was behind her place was a grammar school. Nobody was at the school today except some kids playing basketball on the courts behind the classrooms. He walked past them, across a soccer field and another acre or so of lawn. A chainlink fence made up the far boundary. On the other side of that was Miller Creek, and on the other side of the creek was the blue bungalow. He could see part of its ass end when he got to the fence, but the rest was hidden by the trees and oleanders.

Another thing he could see was that it was a short distance down the bank, across the mostly dry creekbed, and up the other bank into those bushes. Be easy enough to find your way in the dark if you were careful. You wouldn’t need to climb the fence, either. There was a gate about twenty yards away. Why they’d put a gate in the fence here was anybody’s guess, but there it was. The padlock on it was an old Schindler. He grinned when he saw that. Hell, with one of the passkeys they had at Mossman Hardware, you could open that puppy up in about two seconds flat.

Eight o’clock Monday morning, he was back across the street from the blue bungalow. He didn’t have to be at work until ten and he was hoping the blonde would leave for whatever job she had long before that. Sure enough, she came out at about eight-twenty. All dressed up in a tan suit, that tawny blonde hair piled high on top of her head. Sweetmeat for a treat!

He followed her red Miata downtown. She stopped for coffee and a doughnut or something at a bakery on Fourth and then she went to the Merchants’ Exchange Bank on Hollowell. The bank wasn’t open yet, but somebody let her in and she didn’t come out again. So that had to be where she worked.

He took another ride to the bank on his lunch hour, and this time he went inside. He saw her right away. She wasn’t a teller — she had her own desk and she was tapping away on a computer, her lower lip caught between her teeth. He tried not to stare too hard as he walked by. There was one of those little nameplates on her desk and that was how he found out her name was Julie Brock.

Over the next week he found out some more things about her, just by hanging around the bank and her neighborhood. Turned out she wasn’t married or living with anybody. She did have a boyfriend, handsome football player type who drove a fuckin’ Mercedes. The boyfriend stayed late at her bungalow a couple of times, but not the whole night. Which maybe meant he was married, or maybe it didn’t mean anything at all. Guy didn’t come over every night, either, only on Friday and Saturday. During the week, she turned out her lights and hit the sack before eleven. Probably because she had to get up early for her job.

The following Monday night, he left his apartment a little before ten and drove to the grammar school. He made sure nobody was around before he went into the schoolyard, across to the chainlink fence. He was scared and excited, both. He knew he was taking a real big risk, he’d had a lot of conversations with himself about that, but he hadn’t been able to talk himself out of it. Crazy, sure, but it was the only way he’d ever get to see her alone, up close and personal.

He slipped through the gate, picked his way across the creek and up into her yard without making enough noise to carry. The rear windows and back entrance were dark, but he found a lighted window on the far side. The curtains were open and the room inside was plain as day. Oh, man, it was her bedroom! She wasn’t in there, but the covers on the bed were turned down and more light was showing behind a partly open door in the far wall.

He stepped into a patch of tree shadow, his mouth dry and metal-tasting. It was a perfect spot for looking, only about twenty-five feet of lawn between him and the window. He waited there, so damn excited he had trouble catching his breath.

And then he heard the sound of a toilet flushing and she walked out of the bathroom, and all she was wearing was a bra and panties. Bug-eyed, he watched her move around here and there, arranging clothes and stuff. And then she started doing a bunch of exercises, bending over, stretching, jumping, twisting, all that fine glistening flesh shaking and quivering.

He didn’t think the show could get any better, but pretty soon it did. As soon as she stopped exercising, she reached up behind her and unhooked her bra and let it fall. A couple of seconds later she was out of her panties, too. Natural blonde! He couldn’t believe he was seeing her like that, all of her, naked. Hot and sweaty and naked, right there in front of him, rubbing her hands under her breasts and down over her hips...

Man, oh, man, oh man oh man oh man ohmanohmanohmanohmanohman — oh!

He kept going back there. After that show the first night, he wouldn’t’ve stayed away for a million bucks. Didn’t go Friday or Saturday, but most every other night. Once the boyfriend was there even though it wasn’t the weekend, the two together in the sack, but the only light was in the bathroom and he couldn’t see much of what they were doing. Another time she had the curtains closed for some damn reason. The rest of the nights it was showtime. Into the bedroom she’d come in bra and panties, fuss around, do those exercises for about ten minutes, get naked, rub up that hot sweaty body for a minute or so, then go take a shower and get into bed and shut off the light. Man, it was better than any video he’d ever seen, porn or otherwise.

Then one night, a real warm night, she had the bedroom window open for some air. She came out and did her number, and he must’ve shifted around and made a noise or something because all of a sudden she quit exercising and moved to the window and stood peering out. He was pretty sure she couldn’t see him out in the dark, but he froze anyway. She stood staring for a few seconds and then, quick, she shut the window and went and turned out the light before she got into bed.

He should’ve taken that as a warning and not gone back for a while. But he didn’t. He went back the next night at the same time.

And that was his big mistake.

The lights were on in her bedroom, same as usual, but he didn’t see her as he slipped through the oleanders to his ringside spot. He figured she was still in the bathroom, which was always a relief because a time or two he’d got there a little late and missed part of the show. He eased forward into the patch of tree shadow, licking his lips.

And all of a sudden a bright beam of light hit him square in the eyes and a voice, her voice, said hard and angry, “You dirty damn pervert!”

He almost jumped out of his skin. Panic surged in him and he’d’ve taken off, run like the fuckin’ wind if she hadn’t said, “Stand right there — I have a gun, I’ll shoot if you move.”

He froze. Heard himself say, “A gun?” in a voice like a frog croaking.

“That’s right, and I know how to use it. You don’t think I’d be out here waiting for you unarmed, do you?”

“Listen, I’m sorry, Julie, I didn’t mean nothing—”

“Oh, so you know my name. Well, I know you, too, you fat creep, I’ve seen you before. What were you planning to do? Sneak in some night and rape me?”

“No! Jesus, no, I never would’ve done nothing like that, I never would’ve hurt you...”

“You just like to watch, is that it? Well, your Peeping Tom days are over right now.”

“What... what’re you gonna do?”

“Call the police, that’s what I’m going to do.”

“No, wait, you can’t—”

“Can’t I? You just watch me. Go on, get moving.”

“Moving? Where?”

“Into the house, where do you think?”

He didn’t want to go into the house. He still wanted to run, but what good would that do? She could identify him, she’d sic the cops on him anyway—

“Move, I said. If you don’t do what I say, if you try anything, I’ll shoot you. I mean it, I will.”

For a few seconds more it was like he was paralyzed. Then he wasn’t anymore, his legs were moving and taking him out onto the lawn. The flashlight glare slid out of his eyes — she was over on the other side of the tree — but he was still half blind. He stumbled and heard somebody make a little moaning sound... him, it came out of him. She told him to walk around to the back door and he did that. She told him to open it and go inside and he did that, too.

Kitchen. He stood there blinking, trying to focus, so scared he was shaking all over. She came in behind him, looped around to one of those breakfast bar counters a few feet away. She had a gun, all right. Little silver automatic that caught the light and seemed to be winking at him.

“Sit down at the table over there,” she said.

Still blinking, he started over to the table. Then he stopped and swung his head toward her again. Now she had a cordless phone in her other hand. Her eyes shifted back and forth between him and the phone, her face all scrunched up and hot-eyed, and she wasn’t the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen anymore, she wasn’t even pretty, she was a hag as ugly as he was getting ready to have him arrested, put in prison —

He lunged at her. Didn’t think about what he was doing, just did it. She swung the gun up and squeezed the trigger point blank. She’d’ve killed him sure, shot him down like a dog, except that the little automatic must’ve jammed, it didn’t go off, and in the next second he was on her.

He knocked the fuckin’ gun out of her hand, yanked the phone away from her. She opened up her mouth to scream. He jammed his hand over it, dragged her body in tight against his. Even then, even after she’d tried to blow his brains out, he didn’t have any idea of hurting her, only wanted to keep her from yelling somehow so he could get away. But she fought and squirmed, kicking his shins, clawing his arm, it was like he had hold of a wildcat. She got one arm all the way loose and those long nails slashed up and ripped furrows in his neck. That hurt, really hurt. Made him mad and kind of wild himself. He couldn’t hold her, and she twisted her body and pulled loose and tried to break his balls with her knee.

The next thing he knew he was hitting her with the phone. Hitting her, hitting her, hitting her until she quit making noises and quit fighting and fell down on the floor on her back. There was blood all over her face and head and her eyes were wide open with a lot of the white showing. He saw that and he wasn’t wild anymore. He stared at her, stared at the blood, stared at the bloody phone in his hand. He made the same kind of sound he’d made outside and dropped the phone and went down on one knee beside her. Picked up one of her wrists — limp, no pulse — and put his fingers against her neck and didn’t feel any pulse there, either.

Dead!

Then he ran. Ran like there was a pack of junkyard dogs on his heels. Out of the kitchen, across the yard, through the bushes, across the creek, through the fence gate, across the schoolyard and out to where he’d parked his wheels. Not caring how much noise he made or if anybody saw him, not caring about anything except getting far away from there.

He didn’t remember driving home. He was running and then he was at the car and then he was in his apartment putting on the dead bolt and the chain lock. He was shaking so hard he could hear a clicking sound, his teeth knocking together or maybe the bones rattling inside his skin. When he put on the light he saw blood on his hands, on his shirt and jacket. He ripped all his clothes off and got into the shower and scrubbed and scrubbed, but he couldn’t make himself feel clean. He couldn’t get warm, either, not even lying in bed with the electric blanket turned all the way up.

He lay there in the dark, his head full of pictures of her lying on her kitchen floor all bloody and dead. But it wasn’t his fault. She’d tried to kill him, hadn’t she? Clawed him, tried to break his balls? He hadn’t wanted to hurt her — she’d made him do it in self-defense. Her fault, not his. Hers, hers, hers!

He kept listening for the doorbell. Waiting for the cops to come. He’d tell them it wasn’t his fault, but he knew they’d take him to jail anyway

Only the cops didn’t come. He lay wide awake the whole night, waiting, and in the morning he was amazed he was still alone.

He called up his boss, Mr. Mossman, and said he was sick, he wouldn’t be in today. Then he put on his robe and sat in his recliner with the TV going for noise and waited for the cops to show up.

All day he sat there and still no cops.

At six o’clock he switched over to the news and pretty soon he heard her name, saw her picture flash on the screen. Julie Brock, twenty-seven, found dead in her rented bungalow on Acacia Street, bludgeoned to death with a cordless phone. Neighbors had heard noises, one of them saw a man running away but couldn’t describe him because it’d been too dark. The TV guy said the police were working on several leads and expected to make an arrest soon. Maybe that was the truth and maybe it wasn’t. All he could do was sit scared, wait scared to find out.

He waited four whole days, there in the apartment the whole time. Told Mr. Mossman he had the flu and Mr. Mossman said take care of himself, get plenty of rest, drink plenty of liquids. He drank plenty of liquids, all right. Beer, wine, scotch, every kind of alcohol he had in the place. Watched TV, drank, threw up most of what he ate, and waited.

The cops never did show up.

On the fifth day he wasn’t so scared anymore. On the sixth day he was hardly scared at all and he went out for the first time to buy some more beer and booze. On the seventh day he knew they weren’t going to come and arrest him, not ever. He couldn’t say how he knew that, he just did.

The furrows on his neck were mostly healed by then, but he put on a high-necked shirt and buttoned the top button to make sure the marks didn’t show. Then he went back to work. Mr. Mossman said it was good to have him back. That night, when he went to the Starlite Tavern, his buddies said the same thing and bought him a couple of rounds of drinks and he won eight bucks shooting pool.

Things settled down to normal again. He worked and went to the Starlite and Freedom Lanes and Henson’s Card Room, the same as he used to, and the whole crazy thing with Julie Brock faded and faded until he wasn’t thinking about her at all anymore. It was as if none of it ever happened. Not just that last night in her bungalow — all the nights before it, the whole crazy business. He couldn’t even remember what she looked like.

A lot more time passed, and his life was just the way it’d been before, good sometimes, boring sometimes, lonely sometimes. And then one day he was working behind the counter at the hardware store and he looked up and this babe was standing there. A redhead — oh, man, the most gorgeous redhead he’d ever seen. His eyes bugged out like they were on stalks. Young, slim, that red hair like fire around her head, white skin smooth as cream, a great rack poking out the front of her sweater, her mouth big and soft and smiling at him. He stared and stared, but she didn’t stop smiling. Real friendly type, wanted to buy a space heater and some other stuff for her new apartment.

He showed her around, helped her pick out the best items, wrote up her order. She wanted to know could she have it delivered, and he said sure, you bet, and she gave him her address along with her credit card. He watched her walk out, the way her ass swung under her green skirt, and his mouth was dry and he felt all hot and cold inside and his johnson was having fits in his shorts.

He couldn’t stop thinking about her all day. She was the most beautiful, exciting woman he’d ever feasted his eyes on. Before he got off work he packed up her order so he could deliver it himself, personally. He had to see her again, see where she lived. There wasn’t any harm in that, was there?

Just looking?