looked back over his shoulder. “The hell she says! I made up that order. I put that cat food in. Four cans, or six. I forget.”
Vern smiled and shrugged. “So she mislaid them. So we lose four cans of cat food. She’s a good customer.”
“Every week a big order,” Gus said.
“A good program is coming up, Vern,” Walter said.
“I’m taking me a nap. Hard night last night.”
He went back into the kitchen and got a noisy glass of water. While the water was roaring into the sink, he used the cover of the sound to take a spoon from the silver drawer and slip it in his pocket. He went up to his third-floor room and stood in the silence for a moment until the rib-cage fluttering died down. He had heard Bonny’s music still playing, as he came down the hall.
He shut his door as he left his room, and went as quickly and silently as he could down to the second floor. He could hear the gusts of mechanical laughter coming over the television downstairs. He hoped it would hold them down there.
He went into Teena’s room and she came up off the bed, drawn as tight as harp strings. Her whisper was too aspirated. “You got it?”
He nodded. He went to her dressing table and opened the box. She stood close beside him, so close he could hear her hard fast breathing. He fitted the hypo together, held the sharp tip briefly in his lighter flame.
“Can you do it?” she whispered.
“I’ve watched it done.”
“I’ve never given it to myself. God, we’ve got to be careful.” She went to her closet and came back with a thin red belt, which she wound tightly around her left arm, above the elbow. He had poured the white powder, faintly yellow-tinged, into the bowl of the spoon. He set his flaming lighter on the corner of the dressing table. She said, her voice shaking, “You cook and I’ll fill the hypo, and take it off the fire when I tell you, or it’ll be gone. Then you take the hypo quick and do it.”
The powder over the flame moved, changed, melted.
“Now!” she said. He took it off the flame. Her hands shook badly. “Hold it steady, Vern. Please.” She filled it, handed it to him, worked her fist. The scarred vein bulged blue in the milky socket of the elbow. He held the needle up, pushed on the plunger until a drop stood yellowish on the point.
“Hurry,” she said. “Oh, God, hurry!”
He felt awkward, faintly ill, as he slid the tip into the vein. It was harder to puncture than he had thought it would be. He bit his lip. She watched, her mouth working. She looked like thin gray lines drawn on pale paper. He pushed the plunger slowly and emptied the calibrated tube into her blood. He pulled the needle free and watched her.
She stood braced, her eyes half shut. Her pale upper lip wormed upward over her teeth in a look that was savage and sexual. For a moment the whites of her eyes showed, the pupils rolled upward. The red belt slid, like a slow snake, to the floor. Hungry nerves fed on the drug and were mended. Her color changed. She looked at him and her eyes were soft and her mouth was soft. “Aw, Vern. Aw, honey!” she said in a sleepy, lazy voice. “Aw, how I needed that!” She went to her bed, seeming more to drift than to walk.
He stood there, feeling a refinement of the sense of power, feeling a hard domination. It made him feel bigger and stronger than anything that had ever happened to him. With this you could control another human being utterly, completely. She sat flushed on the edge of the bed, rocking slowly from side to side in beat with music only she could hear, and she looked through and beyond the high corners of the room. It was, he thought, like having a woman, only more so—distilled, intensified.
It was like something that had happened to him a long time ago, back in that faraway town of slag heaps, of rows of smoke-dingy identical houses that were set on the dirt shoulder of the deep ravine, that town where the coal dust was pocked deep in the faces of the
Vern smiled and shrugged. “So she mislaid them. So we lose four cans of cat food. She’s a good customer.”
“Every week a big order,” Gus said.
“A good program is coming up, Vern,” Walter said.
“I’m taking me a nap. Hard night last night.”
He went back into the kitchen and got a noisy glass of water. While the water was roaring into the sink, he used the cover of the sound to take a spoon from the silver drawer and slip it in his pocket. He went up to his third-floor room and stood in the silence for a moment until the rib-cage fluttering died down. He had heard Bonny’s music still playing, as he came down the hall.
He shut his door as he left his room, and went as quickly and silently as he could down to the second floor. He could hear the gusts of mechanical laughter coming over the television downstairs. He hoped it would hold them down there.
He went into Teena’s room and she came up off the bed, drawn as tight as harp strings. Her whisper was too aspirated. “You got it?”
He nodded. He went to her dressing table and opened the box. She stood close beside him, so close he could hear her hard fast breathing. He fitted the hypo together, held the sharp tip briefly in his lighter flame.
“Can you do it?” she whispered.
“I’ve watched it done.”
“I’ve never given it to myself. God, we’ve got to be careful.” She went to her closet and came back with a thin red belt, which she wound tightly around her left arm, above the elbow. He had poured the white powder, faintly yellow-tinged, into the bowl of the spoon. He set his flaming lighter on the corner of the dressing table. She said, her voice shaking, “You cook and I’ll fill the hypo, and take it off the fire when I tell you, or it’ll be gone. Then you take the hypo quick and do it.”
The powder over the flame moved, changed, melted.
“Now!” she said. He took it off the flame. Her hands shook badly. “Hold it steady, Vern. Please.” She filled it, handed it to him, worked her fist. The scarred vein bulged blue in the milky socket of the elbow. He held the needle up, pushed on the plunger until a drop stood yellowish on the point.
“Hurry,” she said. “Oh, God, hurry!”
He felt awkward, faintly ill, as he slid the tip into the vein. It was harder to puncture than he had thought it would be. He bit his lip. She watched, her mouth working. She looked like thin gray lines drawn on pale paper. He pushed the plunger slowly and emptied the calibrated tube into her blood. He pulled the needle free and watched her.
She stood braced, her eyes half shut. Her pale upper lip wormed upward over her teeth in a look that was savage and sexual. For a moment the whites of her eyes showed, the pupils rolled upward. The red belt slid, like a slow snake, to the floor. Hungry nerves fed on the drug and were mended. Her color changed. She looked at him and her eyes were soft and her mouth was soft. “Aw, Vern. Aw, honey!” she said in a sleepy, lazy voice. “Aw, how I needed that!” She went to her bed, seeming more to drift than to walk.
He stood there, feeling a refinement of the sense of power, feeling a hard domination. It made him feel bigger and stronger than anything that had ever happened to him. With this you could control another human being utterly, completely. She sat flushed on the edge of the bed, rocking slowly from side to side in beat with music only she could hear, and she looked through and beyond the high corners of the room. It was, he thought, like having a woman, only more so—distilled, intensified.
It was like something that had happened to him a long time ago, back in that faraway town of slag heaps, of rows of smoke-dingy identical houses that were set on the dirt shoulder of the deep ravine, that town where the coal dust was pocked deep in the faces of the
Similar Books
