Angel of Mercy by Andrew Neiderman Page B

afternoon? Fine. I tell you what, though.
    I would rather take you to lunch.
    Why don’t I come by at twelve? Is that all right? It is?
    Great. See you then. Bye, Susie.”
    He cradled the receiver and sat back with a smile on his face as if he had actually made the call. When he gazed down at himself, he was surprised to see he had a thick erection. His penis reminded him of a small rodent sniffing the air. He gazed around helplessly for a moment.
    Then he got up quickly and went to his bag of toiletdes and took out his electric razor. He plugged it in beside the sofa and sat down. He kept his eyes closed until he turned on the razor, placing the rear side of it against his throbbing penis. The vibrations reverberated up and down the stem, making him quiver until he had an orgasm that he thought would never end. His hands and his wrist were soaked, as was the electric razor.
    He quickly wiped it dry and put it away and then he took a hot shower and lay down.
    When Susie and he were married, this sort of thing would stop, he thought. He would have sex just the way he was supposed to and he would make babies in Susie’s body just the way he was supposed to.
    He fell asleep dreaming of her beside him, her bad leg draped over his hip.
    Faye had parked her car in her designated space under the carport and had hurriedly stepped out and up the blue-and-white tile steps bordered in bright red bougainvillea to the front door of their two-bedroom apartment without spotting Corpsy Ratner. Her attention was on their daily newspaper, stuffed awkwardly in the newspaper pouch on the side of her door. The lid to her mailbox was up because there was so much mail shoved into it, mostly junk mail. Just as she paused to gather everything, the front door of the neighboring apartment opened and Tillie Kaufman peered out. The seventy Lone-year-old woman with short blue-gray hair clicked her tongue and shook her head. She was tall and plump, with a remarkably cherry-white complexion for a woman of her age.
    Faye paused, anticipating.
    “Your newspaper was lying on the sidewalk again. I knocked on the door to tell your sister, but she didn’t answer. She’s home?”
    “No, she’s on a job,” Faye snapped.
    “Well, I put the paper in the box before one of those young hooligans could come along to steal it. They usually do if they find one still lying here in the afternoon.”
    “Thank you, Mrs. Kaufman.”
    “I heard you go out during the night. An emergency?” her nosy neighbor inquired. Unless elderly people were sick or in mourning, Faye found them distasteful and annoying. She hoisted her small shoulders and pulled herself into a stiff posture.
    “Why else do you think I’d go out that time of the night, Mrs.
    Kaufman?”
    The old lady nodded and then shook her head.
    “Somebody’s always very sick.”
    “Of course somebody’s always very sick. Especially in a community that has so many elderly inhabitants,” she added. Mrs. Kaufman continued to nod as if her round head with its clipped hair were sitting on a small spring.
    “Morris has the gout again. This on top of his high blood pressure.”
    “It doesn’t surprise me, not with the food you feed him. You don’t listen.”
    “I try, but he gets so angry. He says food’s food.
    He’s eating the same things he ate all his life.”
    “He’s not supposed to eat the same things. He’s older.”
    Mrs. Kaufman shrugged.
    “He doesn’t think so. I tell him to come out of the sun, but he doesn’t listen. I tell him to stop smoking those smelly cigars, but he doesn’t stop.”
    “He will,” Faye said.
    “When?”
    “When he’s dead,” she replied, and jabbed the key into the door lock.
    Tillie wasn’t shocked. She continued to nod.
    “I told him that, too, but he doesn’t listen. So who was so sick?” she asked as Faye pulled the mail out of the box.
    “You don’t know her,” she replied.
    “It’s very nice: you being a nurse. I wish I had become a nurse