Vida Nocturna Part 6

"Sara!"

Her mother's icy voice echoed in the tiny room. "What are you doing in here?"

The giant can of hairspray shook in Sara's seven-year-old hands. "You told me to look nice for the party, Mummy. You told me to fix my hair." She struggled to free the hairbrush that had become tangled and plastered against the side of her head.

Her mother knocked the can from her hands, sending it flying against the baby blue velvet ferns of the textured wallpaper. "I said I would do it for you later. You are not to be here, Sara. This is my bathroom, my private s.p.a.ce!" She laughed once, making a quick, sour bark. "But you're just like your father, treating me like I don't exist while you just go and put on your little show." Mummy stared at Sara, pursing her lips and looking like she was about to cry, but then her face hardened. She grabbed for the brush.

"I know, Mummy. I'm sorry. I- ow!"

The brush dropped to the blue plush carpet, wrapped in Sara's dark hair. Her scalp throbbed. Sara wailed.

"Shut up!" Mummy's hand swung down from the ceiling, spanking again and again. Sometimes it hit her bottom, sometimes her back, shoulders, or neck."I don't need this today, Sara."

Sara sobbed. Mummy s.n.a.t.c.hed her by one arm and yanked her out of the bathroom, pinching so tightly that Sara's hand went cold. "You're not fooling me, you little s.h.i.+t!" Mummy said. Sara squirmed. She couldn't think. She tried to run, but Mummy yanked the arm, which twisted like rope as she rose to her tiptoes. Mummy slapped some more, hitting Sara's head and face as she spun. Something crunched and popped in Sara's elbow and her fingers went numb.

Sara ... disappeared. Not all of her. Her body was still there. She could still see and hear. Even talk if there was someone to listen. But part of her was sliding down inside her mind, disappearing like Alice in the rabbit hole. That little part- that little Sara- landed in complete darkness deep inside, insulated and alone. She stopped crying. The insulated little Sara knew that crying was useless. Her arm throbbed, but that was useless, too. After a few more swings, Mummy stopped hitting and let go of the arm, which Sara let hang loosely at her side.

Mummy grabbed the shoulder of Sara's dress, pus.h.i.+ng her along. Together they marched down the hall and down the stairs, faster than Sara could comfortably walk. Mummy was still talking fast. "You know we're throwing this very important party tonight, and on top of everything else I have to search all over for you. And when I find you I see you don't have the common decency to leave other people's things alone! Stop sniffling like it's so tough on you! This is what happens when you are bad."

Down inside wherever she was, the little Sara remembered the Alice book. It should have been scary, but words on paper were never as frightening as when real things happened. Maybe that was why the little part of her there saw only words now, white letters suspended on the pitch black all around her. Mummy's words.

This is what happens when you are bad.

Being here was like cheating! All the other times she had been bad, she had felt the pain. The twisting, the hitting ... sometimes the bruises would hurt for a really long time. But now, down here, separated from her body like this, she felt nothing. Sara had become so bad now she was cheating her way out of her punishment.

Karen, a filing clerk from her father's office, stood at the muted gold-colored counter, picking at a plant with her usual blank expression. Sometimes Mummy was really nice when guests were visiting, but Karen didn't count. She seemed to blend in with the busy beige pattern on the wallpaper behind her.

Mummy heaved Sara forward like a bowling ball.

Mummy's face looked angry and sick, like maybe someone had just given her poison. "Do you think this is a day when I have time for your little games, Sara? Do you?"

Sara's face felt loose and her mouth hung open.

"Look at this place! Can't you see how hard I'm working!" Her mother's shriek rose in pitch and volume. "And on the day of the most important party of my career, you just had to show me how little I mean to you, is that it?"

Her mother grabbed the back of Sara's neck, turning her toward the counter and pus.h.i.+ng her face down into the sink, where it hovered over the plate she'd used for lunch.

"What's the meaning of this?" her mother said. It sounded like her teeth were clenched together. The hand on Sara's neck rocked her whole body as her mother took huge, hissing breaths.

Sara managed to speak, but all her words came out with the same tone. "I'm sorry, Mummy. It was just one hamburger bun from the back of the refrigerator and a little bit of cheese. I didn't know it was party food-"

"Oh, poor, pathetic little baby! Don't you try that s.h.i.+t, thinking you're going to make Karen feel sorry for you. You know I don't care about a hamburger bun. What I do care about is the G.o.dd.a.m.ned mess! You can't just leave dirty dishes just lying out!"

A smear of white on the plate still clung to a few stray sesame seeds. The edge of the sink was wet. She hunched her shoulders to keep from staining the plaid dress that matched her mother's.

From inside the sink, Mummy's voice sounded far away. "This is not the time for you to make a statement about how little you respect me, Sara. You've made that point well enough already. You know everything has to be perfect today, and still you go out of your way to mess it up. My career is very important, Sara, and I will not have it spoiled because of you. Now clean it up!"

Once during a big argument Daddy had laughed at Mummy when she'd talked about her career. He'd said that organizing the volunteers of the North Sh.o.r.e Ladies' League couldn't be a career because n.o.body paid her to do it.

Mummy released her grip. Sara reached for the plate. "I'm sorry, Mummy. The dishwasher was running when- "

Her mother turned to Karen and the plant, her anger vanis.h.i.+ng. Now she was official, like a boss. "Karen, I told you to throw that d.a.m.ned thing out. Why is it still here?"

"Oh, well, you said it was dead, but really it just had a few brown leaves. I thought- "

Mummy turned away, s.n.a.t.c.hing the phone and dialing a number. "Just throw it out. Once they start to go, there's no sense in keeping them around." Sara reached under the sink to find the dish soap.

"Doctor Harris Garner, please," Mummy said into the phone. "Yes. This is Lacey Usher of the Ladies' League." Her voice sounded very proper, like a queen telling someone the rules in a movie.

In the black nothing where the little Sara had gone, words appeared all by themselves: The Queen of Hearts.

Sara scrubbed the plate and rinsed it, closing one eye to watch Mummy without having to turn her head. If Mummy was a queen, then Sara must be a princess. Her head felt like a sunburn at the place where the hairs had come out.

"Doctor Garner? Lacey Usher. I was just calling to thank you for your very generous donation to the League's Christmas drive this year ... Yes. It's ... Yes." Now Mummy's voice sounded happy and giggly. "It's so nice to see a doctor who knows there's more to life than medicine, Doctor Garner, and we- oh, Harry, then, thank you, and do call me Lacey ... I hope you're still planning on coming to our little party tonight at the house, it wouldn't be the same without you ... Great. Oh, no, if you're late for paddle tennis, I completely understand that you have to go- that's how you stay in such great shape, I'm sure. Oh, yes. People notice. We'll see you in about five hours, then."

Sara washed the coffee cups in the sink, too. Lipstick was always hard to scrub. Her mother turned to Karen as she hung up the phone, her smile fading like a camera flash.

"Well, at least one thing's going right," she told Karen. "Harry will be here tonight ... with that dingbat wife of his. I just hope Sara will behave once the party starts; I don't know how much more of this I can take from her."

Karen nodded sympathetically to Mummy, her eyes drooping like a tired hound's.

Sara dried the last cup and placed it back in the cabinet, heading quickly out the kitchen door. Her mother's voice followed her.

"For some reason she always acts up around the holidays. You know last year she gave her father this lovely little thing she'd made at school, made of wood with little seeds glued onto it, but then she gave me this ugly lump of clay with horrible google eyes stuck in. She was trying to tell me how much she hated me, as if I didn't already know."

Mummy's words hung suspended. Ugly lump of clay with horrible google eyes... Down deep inside the rabbit hole, little Sara remembered the gift. It was supposed to have been an elephant.

The city lights flew past as the shuddering machine carried them off to the Blue Lotus, with the radio pounding out an electronic rhythm.

"I feel great," she said. "Really. I mean, I remember feeling all warm and tingly like this when I did c.o.ke before, but I've never felt anything so intense. I'm not afraid of anything. Bring on the crowds! I could probably jump off a building and not even feel it." She laughed and laughed. That was the funniest idea in the entire world.

Her mouth kept going. "And the memories? Like about my backstabbing friends and my family- all that s.h.i.+t- just gone! Like magic. It's probably from when you bit me the other night." The whole city seemed to echo with the power of her laugh.

"Sure," he said. "It couldn't be that I have better c.o.ke than high school boys do."

"Yeah, okay," she said, smiling and running her fingertips over the dashboard. "But if it's all c.o.ke, why do I feel so comfortable? c.o.ke's supposed to make me all hyper and jittery. But this is perfect. It's just a perfect, perfect, perfect feeling. I'm not nervous at all. I feel so strong. I'm invincible!" She laughed again. "Something big is about to happen. Any minute now. I can feel it. Can't you feel it?"

He didn't respond.

"It doesn't matter, that thing you said about hunger. I've been hungry my whole life. I was hungry for love, you know? And ... and friends.h.i.+p ... and, and trust. So, if I suddenly was hungry for blood, what'd be different? At least there'd be plenty of it around."

"One more of these, please," Sara said, raising her gla.s.s to show the waiter as he pa.s.sed behind her. She didn't need to see him. She'd smelled the hint of cologne he wore mixed with some shots of tequila and pieces of lime on the tray he carried. She watched the dancers out on the floor, gyrating to Aldo Nova: "... Life is just a fantasy. Can you live this fantasy life?"

Her blood ma.s.saged her from the inside, racing through her as it delivered its magical power through every microscopic capillary.

Cameron appeared across the table, leaning in to say something to Neil, who immediately stood up. A coppery smell overpowered everything else in the air as Cameron came around to Alexander. Neil and Alexander nodded to each other. Alexander cursed and took off his jacket, handing it to Cameron, who covered up with it as they all got up and moved out the back door.

The door latched behind them. Shapes moved in the darker corners of the alley, materializing into several standing figures. Alexander took Sara's hand and ran. They turned a corner and then quickly turned again into a narrow alley. Only one of the figures followed them, but Sara couldn't run fast enough in her heels. She tried to kick off her shoes.

An arm appeared around her throat. The blood vessels in her neck pinched shut. Her a.s.sailant's raspy breath seemed louder in her ears. The arm around her neck was unnaturally hot - more than feverish - and it was pulling her backwards. She tried to pull it away but she didn't have the strength. She wriggled and kicked. The alley spun.

Alexander was suddenly in front of her. He raised a gun, pulling the trigger. The gun popped and jerked. She snapped her head to the side, gasping as her face burned, painted with hot gas from the gun and the warm contents of what had been her attacker's skull. The arm reluctantly released her as the mostly-headless body collapsed to the concrete.

Alexander was saying something, but his words just floated past without registering. He sc.r.a.ped some of the stuff off her face and neck with his fingers and flung it to the ground. He took her hand and pulled her away.

Sara clenched her teeth, half gagging, half exhaling. The mammoth black car was snarling down some thoroughfare she didn't know. Her arms were tight, crossed over her rigid chest and stomach. The blood she'd wiped from her face was drying between her fingers, making them itch as it cemented them to her coat sleeves.

Alexander reached for a cigarette as he changed lanes, pus.h.i.+ng in the lighter.

"Don't," she said, choking around the word, her chin still on her chest. "If you fill this car with smoke, I'm gonna fill it with puke, I swear to G.o.d."

He took the cigarette from his lips, placing it behind his ear. The lighter popped but he left it alone, reaching instead to turn on the radio. Echoing, electronic sounds poured from the speakers.

She switched it off, leaving the k.n.o.b smeared and sticky. "How about you tell me what the f.u.c.k just happened back in the alley?"

He shook his head, watching the road. "Neil p.i.s.sed off those guys a while ago. You know how he is. And then he just kept makin' it worse ... But I thought it was all over by now."

Trying to shake her head made her dizzy. "So ... It wasn't over, and you shot that guy in the face? That's not a good enough explanation."

His head pivoted toward her. The car didn't slow. "I shot him in the face because he would've killed you if I didn't. Is that good enough?" His eyes, too steely for emeralds now, locked on hers.

She snapped her face away to look out the winds.h.i.+eld, shuddering and tightening her arms around herself. Something spongy rolled under her fingertips.

She worked the window crank, getting it most of the way open before her stomach emptied itself of what was probably fifty dollars' worth of the club's booze. She stayed like that, clutching the top of the window, her head in the frigid wind, until they turned onto a Lincoln Park street she recognized.

She pulled her head in and rolled up the window, resisting the urge to wipe her mouth with the back of her hand. "So were those the same guys who chased us in the car before?"

"Yeah." He parked in a garage next to her building. "I'll help you up to your place."

Sara kept her face down as they moved through the lobby, but a few people stared anyway. He put his arm around her. Her matted hair had dried, leaving it hard and crackly as she leaned against his chest and pushed the elevator b.u.t.ton.

"Don't worry about it," he said. "You're all right." She put her arm around his waist, squeezing him tighter.

"Besides," he said, cracking his tiny smile as the elevator doors closed, "you look good in red."

She glanced at her face in the elevator mirror, smeared with clotted red and brown streaks, and the thin sh.e.l.l of decorum she'd managed was shattered. She pushed him away as the elevator started up. "How can you joke like that? Look at me! I can't even see myself because of all the blood! This isn't some ... some game. That guy's really ..." Her stomach tightened again. "You killed him."

Her mouth wouldn't close. She choked down the first few sobs but more pushed through. She retched but nothing came up. The elevator doors opened. He helped her out. They stood on the landing as the doors closed, Sara staring at his smooth, expressionless face.

"I never said it was a game," he said. "And you're not dead. It's not your blood."

She turned from him, taking a few quick steps. He followed.

Her tears mixed with the slime on her face, sliding down onto her neck. She stopped, turning back.

"How am I supposed to get through tonight," she said. "How can I sit here all alone after this?"

He stared back, silent.

"But this is you," she said. "You're in the middle of it. I see that. And you said it yourself. 'Evil has to be invited in, at least at first.'"

She lowered her chin. Pink tears fell to the hallway's light blue carpet.

"Now I'm supposed to shut myself back in here tonight ... make my same safe little prison. Right? And maybe go crazy. Maybe never come out again- " She sobbed again.

"I can stay, if you want," he said. "It's up to you."

She blinked the tears away and turned, moving quickly down the hall to her door. He followed, staying a few feet back as she worked the lock.

The hollow click echoed through the hall. She retrieved her key and stood there, frozen, her head as empty as that of her attacker, staring into her dark apartment.

She let her eyes lose focus and leaned on the door frame, its metal cool against her cheek. Her voice, barely more than a breathy whisper, sounded foreign in her ears, as if someone else was speaking.

"Won't you come in?"

CHAPTER 4.

Education and the Undead "SARA- Margaret and I would like to see you. I haven't heard about school in a while but I'm sure you're doing well. I look forward to hearing about all your recent victories soon.

I bought a new car. Margaret thought you'd like the old one, so I'm enclosing the t.i.tle and keys. I left it parked at the hospital lot; the security people are keeping an eye on it for me. Give me a call and let me know when you want to come pick it up.

Daddy * *

Sara struggled to put together a dish of a.s.sorted cheeses and a salad of baby artichokes with smoked salmon. Alexander was somewhere over by the stove; she only saw him out of her peripheral vision when he occasionally danced up with completed dishes.

"Let's go, Sara." Terry's eyes appeared over the top of her workstation. "We've already got people waiting out there and you're still the slowest one in my kitchen." She nodded. Terry disappeared. It was still quiet enough to hear the radio: "...Police in California are investigating what appears to be the latest victim of the so-called 'Baby Doll Killer," a serial killer whose signature act is handcuffing young women and leaving them with baby dolls after bleeding them to death ..."

Killer. It made her shudder. She folded her arms, expecting them to feel slippery with blood, but that was all gone now. No witness had come forward about the shooting. No cop had shown up. Alexander had never mentioned it again and had stared blankly at her whenever she'd tried to bring it up.

"Um, sorry ... where do I put this?" A bespectacled waiter who looked a little like Elvis Costello was trying to leave his order but she was running out of s.p.a.ce for them. She took it and placed it on the pickup counter under the others, using a clean plate as a paperweight.

Alexander appeared next to her, taking a few of the tickets and a.s.sembling what he could. She blinked at him. He gave her his little half smile.

"What can I do to help you?"