"The milk bath is for his const.i.tution, of course." She described how during one of the weekly baths Lady Jane simply couldn't help herself and ended up stealing a sip of milk from the hollow of Sir Nigel's collarbone. They were locked in their first pa.s.sionate kiss, sloshing around wantonly in a tub of milk, when the Earl of Buckington, Lady Jane's husband, burst in and had them arrested on trumped-up charges of adultery and treason. By the time she had finished the explanation about how Sir Nigel and Lady Jane escaped from Newgate Prison by covering themselves with lamp oil and squeezing through the bars, Trish and June were both laughing so hard their eyes watered and June was punching a pillow with his fist.

Once she had come up for air, Trish held out the book. "You know where I got this thing?"

"Where?" June said, his voice pitched and girlish, and for some reason this sent them into another round of laughter that had them grasping at their stomachs and gasping for air.

"Rusty," she said, finally, breathing hard. "That's why he went away so mad the other day. He gave me this as a present and then you stopped by and one-upped him with the motor for the swamp cooler."

June sobered considerably. He sat up on the couch and wiped his face. "I did? I didn't mean to."

"I know," Trish said. "Don't worry about it. I think he may have a little bit of a crush on me."

"Well, that's..." June nodded and inhaled deeply. "That's completely understandable."

The moment the words came out, June stiffened and there was a sudden increase in atmospheric pressure: the easy hilarity drained away in a second, leaving behind a wire of tension pulled tight, waiting to be plucked. June stood, looking around, patting at his pockets as if searching for a way to tactfully withdraw.

"I should really..." He pointed to the door. "Thanks for the hot dogs and everything. Good popcorn!"

"You mean you're going to leave us here all alone in the dark?" Trish had meant this in a playful way, an attempt to bring back the banter of a minute ago, but there was a reproachful edge to the words that made June look up, eyes wide, as if she had accused him of something.

"What?" June said. "No. Let me help you with those candles. I'll stay as long as you want me to-or until the power comes back."

She tried to tell him she was only joking, that he was free to go whenever he pleased, but he was already on his knees, scrambling to pick up the scattered candles. Watching him, it struck her that he had every reason to feel awkward, even guilty; here he was pa.s.sing time in the darkened home of a married woman, sitting on her furniture, eating her food, even flirting with her while her husband was away. In their few brief conversations she and June had avoided any discussion of her marital situation, and while he may not have known if she was a plural wife or the more standard variety, he certainly had enough sense to guess that her husband, the hairy giant in the wedding picture prominently displayed on top of the piano, might not take kindly to the idea of a single man spending so much time alone with his wife.

The question was: Why didn't she she feel guilty? She was the married one, after all, the one with commitments and obligations, the one with a daughter upon whom very little was lost. Shouldn't it have bothered her, just a little, that all evening long she'd been considering-and surely this had everything to do with feel guilty? She was the married one, after all, the one with commitments and obligations, the one with a daughter upon whom very little was lost. Shouldn't it have bothered her, just a little, that all evening long she'd been considering-and surely this had everything to do with To Love a Scoundrel To Love a Scoundrel-how it might feel to slip her arms around June's sharp, bony shoulders and put her cheek against his chest? It hadn't occurred to her until now, but lately she had begun to think of herself as single again-Golden was around so little, and even when he was she felt like a married woman in t.i.tle only. And not just single, but old old and single, a withered, b.u.t.toned-up spinster giving off the spinster scents of cedar chest and sachet and laundry starch, filling the empty hours reading silly romance novels, a woman with nothing to lose. and single, a withered, b.u.t.toned-up spinster giving off the spinster scents of cedar chest and sachet and laundry starch, filling the empty hours reading silly romance novels, a woman with nothing to lose.

"We'll be fine, June, thank you," she said, not wanting to come across as too too desperate. After a beat, she added, "If you'll come back and install that fan motor in a day or two I promise I'll make you something better than hot dogs and popcorn." desperate. After a beat, she added, "If you'll come back and install that fan motor in a day or two I promise I'll make you something better than hot dogs and popcorn."

Before going, he helped her place and light the candles: on the mantel and the piano and the dining room table. It had grown fully dark and the walls of the house wavered and pulsed in the flickering light. Trish placed the last candle on the sideboard next to the front window, and June, following behind, lit it with a fresh match. For a moment Trish stood still, taken by the warped image reflected in the gla.s.s: a man and woman, one of each, standing side by side, looking for all the world as if they belonged together. And then her eye caught a movement outside, and she stepped forward, straining to peer through the reflected image into the night beyond.

"What," said June, "something out there?"

She shook her head. "Nothing, it's nothing." But she had seen something that had pa.s.sed across the field of her vision so quickly and unexpectedly, she at first took it to be an apparition or a trick of the mind: a boy, riding his bike slowly down the middle of the road, peering balefully into the dimly lit house as he floated by, his pale face and white, flapping socks ghostly against the darkness, there and then gone.

26.

A SPECIAL BIRTHDAY

SITTING ALONE AT THE TABLE, THE RUBBER BAND ON HIS PARTY HAT biting into the fat under his chin. The hat said biting into the fat under his chin. The hat said HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PODNER!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PODNER!!! with a drawing of a cowboy and Indian with their arms around each other, blowing out the candles on a cake. Gay. Very, very gay. The cowboy looked like Howdy Doody and the Indian like a Chinese lady with a feather in her hair. Everyone in the family had on the same hats, recycled from Clifton's birthday two months ago. with a drawing of a cowboy and Indian with their arms around each other, blowing out the candles on a cake. Gay. Very, very gay. The cowboy looked like Howdy Doody and the Indian like a Chinese lady with a feather in her hair. Everyone in the family had on the same hats, recycled from Clifton's birthday two months ago.

At the head of the table, Rusty stared at his cake, which was not really his because he had to share it with Sasquatch. The cake was a big lumpy chocolate thing with fifty-seven white candles sticking out of it. It looked like a porcupine if the porcupine had been run over by a truck and left at the side of the road. Fifty-seven was the number you'd get if you added Rusty's age to his father's. Rusty was twelve and his father was forty or fifty or something-it was his birthday and he didn't have to do math if he didn't feel like it.

He was alone because everyone else had gone outside to eat hot dogs and take whacks at the pinata. Rusty and his father had already blown out the candles on the cake and opened their presents, which took forever because his father got a present from each and every person in the family, it didn't matter if it was a back-scratcher made from a wire coat hanger or a bunch of macaroni glued together in the form of a horse, his father had to open each one and go, wow, boy, isn't that great, what is it, oh I see, yeah, isn't that wonderful! wow, boy, isn't that great, what is it, oh I see, yeah, isn't that wonderful! What a Sasquatch. What an a-hole. What a Sasquatch. What an a-hole.

Rusty got three presents. Let's see-it was his special birthday, the only one he would ever have, he wasn't allowed to have it at Skate Palace, he had to share his party with Sasquatch, and these were the presents he got: a set of scriptures with his name engraved on the front, a kite, a light blue turtleneck sweater his mother had knitted back when she was in her crazy-obsessive knitting phase. When he opened up the turtleneck everyone told him to put it on and he said, "I don't think so."

"Come on, put it on!" they shouted.

"No."

"Put it on," someone said, "you'll make your mother feel bad."

"My mother's not even here!" He almost shouted it.

"We're taking pictures," said Aunt Nola. "She'll want to see."

So he put it on. "It's choking me," he said in the voice of someone being choked.

"It is not," his father said. "It looks great."

What did Sasquatch the a-hole know? The truth was, it was choking him badly. He was having trouble swallowing. And it was made out of wool or cotton or something that was making him itch. And it did not look great-it looked like c.r.a.p. It looked like something you could buy from Goodwill for a nickel.

Four days ago, Aunt Beverly had come up to the Tower where he was being held for his crimes against humanity to tell him that his mother had checked herself into the hospital for a few days.

"It's nothing serious," she said, "she just needs a little rest. She's feeling run-down. She's had a lot to deal with."

"She can rest in her bed," Rusty said. "She does for most of the day anyway."

"There are people at the hospital who can help her feel better."

"Will she be back for my birthday?"

"We don't know. You'll need to pray for her. She needs your help to feel better."

He thought about it for a few seconds, and then he said it: "Did she have a nervous breakdown?"

Rusty didn't know what a nervous breakdown was, exactly, but when he was little Aunt Nola used to shout at him when he was acting up, Stop that right now or you're going to give your mother another nervous breakdown! Stop that right now or you're going to give your mother another nervous breakdown! Her first nervous breakdown had happened when he was little and he couldn't remember it but he had always understood that he was the one who gave it to her. Her first nervous breakdown had happened when he was little and he couldn't remember it but he had always understood that he was the one who gave it to her.

"I don't think we should call it that," Aunt Beverly said. "You pray for her. You focus on improving your behavior, and she'll be back feeling better."

And now his mother was gone again and he was smiling so hard for Aunt Nola's camera that his face hurt.

When everybody went outside for the hot dogs and the pinata, he stayed at the table. Aunt Trish put her hand on his shoulder. "Coming out? I know you like hot dogs."

He turned away. He didn't want to talk to her, or for her to be nice to him. He wanted her to go away.

"Rusty," she said. "You have every right to be upset."

Yes, yes he did. And it wasn't only because his mother was gone and he was having the cruddiest birthday party since the beginning of Roman civilization. A few nights ago when the power went out and n.o.body was paying attention to him he rode over to Aunt Trish's house because she always made him feel better. And that's when he saw June and Aunt Trish standing in the window together and he knew. June liked Aunt Trish, who was definitely a fox, and Aunt Trish liked June. You could just see it. Which meant June would never like his mother, especially now that she was in the hospital, and Aunt Trish would never like Rusty, which was a stupid thing to think anyway. So his Grand Master Plan was right down the toilet and he was stuck in Old House until the end of time and he didn't know what he was going to do, and so yes, Aunt Trish, yes, he had every dang right to be upset.

Aunt Trish put her hand on his shoulder and the way she was looking at him, all nice and sweet, was going to make him cry. What a gyp! His mouth was already filling with spit. He blinked a lot and told her he had to use the bathroom.

Instead of going to the bathroom he walked around Big House, jogged around the racetrack a couple of times, and then up the stairs, where he lay down in his old bed, but it didn't make him feel any better. He went into the Big Girls' room, rustled through their drawers a little, noted that Pauline was now wearing bras-it was about time, in Rusty's opinion. He stood at the big window that looked onto the front yard. They were all down there stuffing their chow-holes, running around and ha-ha-haing like a gang of out-of-control r.e.t.a.r.ds. His father was wearing one of his birthday gifts, a yellow trucker's hat with DAD spelled in decal letters on the front, and hoisting Dwight Eisenhower by the neck into a tree. Dwight, whose enormous papier-mache head was as big as a television and twice the size of his body, had been made by Novella for her ninth-grade civics cla.s.s project, and now somebody had filled his head with candy and in a few minutes he was going to get the dookie beaten out of him by kids with sticks.

Dwight Eisenhower? Just one more gyp, that's what Rusty thought. If you could have one president to hang from a tree and beat to a pulp for your birthday party, you'd want Albert Einstein or Abraham Lincoln, it wasn't even a contest.

n.o.body had noticed that the birthday boy, the one who was supposed to get the first hot dog off the grill and take the first crack at Dwight Eisenhower and who for one stinking day was supposed to be the most important and special in the family, was nowhere to be seen. n.o.body cared, not the little boys who kept head-b.u.t.ting Sasquatch's legs and tugging at his belt or the girls who were doing cartwheels and end-overs, saying Daddy, Daddy, watch this! Daddy, Daddy, watch this! or the mothers who kept bringing Sasquatch food even though he already had mustard on his nose and half a hot dog sticking out of his mouth. Not the older boys and girls who were at this minute sitting around in their little groups having a hearty chuckle about how hilarious he'd looked in his turtleneck and gay party hat, nearly slipping sideways off his chair after he'd gotten dizzy from trying to blow out all fifty-seven candles with one giant breath. or the mothers who kept bringing Sasquatch food even though he already had mustard on his nose and half a hot dog sticking out of his mouth. Not the older boys and girls who were at this minute sitting around in their little groups having a hearty chuckle about how hilarious he'd looked in his turtleneck and gay party hat, nearly slipping sideways off his chair after he'd gotten dizzy from trying to blow out all fifty-seven candles with one giant breath.

At the top of his lungs he shouted, "I'm not feeling ap-PRE-ciated ap-PRE-ciated!" But n.o.body heard him.

He went downstairs, and instead of going outside to feel bad for himself and eat four or five hot dogs with a big plate of potato salad and make himself sick on pinata candy, which was sorely tempting, he stood at the front door and stared at it for a while, waiting for someone to come through saying, Come on, Rusty, where have you been, we've been wating for you, you get to go first on the pinata! Come on, Rusty, where have you been, we've been wating for you, you get to go first on the pinata!

n.o.body came. He reached out and turned the latch on the deadbolt.

For a long time he waited, staring at the door until his eyes blurred, until somebody tried to open it, giving it a good shake and then pounding on it. "Hey!" It sounded like Parley. "Hey! What the...? The door's locked!"

Rusty waited. There was a lot of shouting and he knew they were going to try to get in through the door off the garage, so he took the racetrack through to the laundry room and got to the garage door, just in time. He went into the kitchen and locked the back door and waited. Suddenly there was Josephine's big round face in the back door window with its mouth open wide so he could see the terrifying braces with their mildewy rubber bands and crusty bolts and wires coated with liquefied hot dog. She shouted low and loud like a man, "It's Rusty! He's the one! It's Ruuuuussssteeeeee!"

He put his hand down his pants, poked his finger through the open fly of his jeans, and she screamed and fell away from the window.

He heard something in the family room. Teague was outside clawing through a rosebush, trying to get at the open window. Rusty shut it and Teague started yelling, tapping hard on the gla.s.s, his arms and neck all scratched up, and though his heart wasn't really in it Rusty turned, pulled down his Toughskins, and showed Teague the moon.

This wasn't nearly as fun as it should have been. He sat on the bottom stair and listened to the pounding on the back door, the faraway rattle of the garage doork.n.o.b. Somewhere Aunt Nola was laughing and Cooter was barking and Aunt Beverly was shouting orders.

Suddenly the front door shook and his father was yelling, "Rusty! Open this door now! Rusty! Just open it up and there won't be any trouble! Rusty!"

Good one, Sasquatch. It didn't take long for his father's hairy arm to come through Cooter's doggy door and start groping around for the doork.n.o.b. Rusty had not considered this possibility. The doggy door was designed to keep burglars and rapists from reaching the lock, but Sasquatch had arms like Too Tall Jones and to Rusty's surprise he was just able to reach it with the tips of his hairy fingers. Suave as the Scoundrel, Rusty went into the dining room and got the wire back-scratcher his father had gotten for his birthday off the table. Just when the hand had figured out how to turn the latch by gripping it between the tips of its middle and ring fingers, Rusty nudged it away with the back-scratcher. This happened twice more until the arm lashed out like a python and tried to s.n.a.t.c.h Rusty by the ankle but Rusty was ready: he jumped back and swatted the hand hard across the knuckles. There was a yelp and the arm disappeared through the doggy door and a few seconds later Cooter came through it, barking and wagging his b.u.t.t.

Rusty gave the dog a squeeze, let him lick his face, which was a charitable act on Rusty's part because Cooter had serious dog-breath that smelled even worse than Rusty's feet. He pushed a sofa end table in front of the doggy door, and took Cooter upstairs to see what was developing outside.

They were attacking the house. There were kids at every first-floor window he could see, and Nephi and Parley were dragging an extension ladder from under the porch. Aunt Beverly stalked around with her best witchy-woman face, while Sasquatch dug around in this work truck, probably looking for an extra house key, and Dwight Eisenhower swayed gently in the breeze.

On this ruined planet he was the last human left and they were vampires, all of them, women, children, and men, and they would do anything to drink his precious blood, they would die without it. He saw them get excited about something, mumbling in their weird vampire language and then they were swarming over to one end of the house. He hustled downstairs and realized the voices he was hearing were coming from the bas.e.m.e.nt. Holy Sweet Jesus Lord G.o.d Almighty, he'd forgotten about the bas.e.m.e.nt.

Naomi was crouched in one of the window wells, prying open the window with her fingers. By the time he reached her, she had her arm and shoulder through, and he whipped at her with the cord from the blinds, but she had the bloodl.u.s.t and she scratched at him and two more vampires squeezed down into the well, trying to reach through the window. He made a big production of hawking up a fat loogie in an attempt to give them fair warning, but they kept on coming, so he launched the loogie directly at Naomi's vampire heart and she shrieked and flailed back, smacking another vampire across the face. Rusty gave her one last shove and shut the window, turned the latch, and ran upstairs to make sure everything was secure.

He heard somebody softly calling his name from the other side of the doggy door. He moved the sofa table out of the way and there, in the doggy door, was Jame-o's face. "Let me in," whispered Jame-o. "I'm on your side."

For some reason, looking at little Jame-o's face stuck in the door, that's when it came over him: he started to bawl. Tears ran down his cheeks and he shuddered with chills.

"What's wrong?" said Jame-o.

Rusty hiccupped and took a breath. "Nothing. Go away."

"Let me in and I'll be on your side."

"You're a vampire," Rusty said. "You can't be trusted."

"I'm not," said Jame-o.

"You are," Rusty said, "I'm sorry, but you are."

"Okay," said Jame-o.

He had to admit it, Rusty liked Jame-o, sort of. Of all the brothers and sisters, Jame-o was the only one who was nice to him. Maybe it was because Jame-o was a weirdo too, whose best friend was a vacuum cleaner, who was ignored by everybody but Rusty and the vacuum cleaner. And maybe it was because Jame-o would do just about anything that Rusty told him, such as the time Rusty convinced him that he had to wear a paper bag over his head to keep out bad thoughts, which he did for most of the day, b.u.mping into walls and tripping over everything, until Aunt Nola made him take it off.

"They've got a ladder," Jame-o whispered. "They're gonna get you."

"Thanks, but I can't let you in," Rusty whispered. He sniffed and wiped at his eyes with the hem of his gay sweater. "I'm on my own here."

He went into the dining room and cut off a big hunk of cake. "Take this." He held it out to Jame-o. "And good luck to you."

There were some complications getting the cake through the doggy door without it crumbling all over the place, but Jame-o got most of it, cupped in his little racc.o.o.n hands, and started eating it right away. Rusty went back upstairs to check the windows. A vampire was at one of them in the Little Boys' room, at the top of a ladder, working at the latch with a screwdriver, which was weird, because did vampires use hand tools? Rusty thought about opening the window and giving the ladder a push, but decided that would only make them madder.

He went down the hall and stood at the door of his mother's room. He hadn't planned on going in there to snoop. A little while ago, before he had tried to blow out all the candles in one breath, they told him to make a wish, and this was what he had wished: that he could learn to be a good person, that he could improve his behavior so that he could come back to live in Big House, that his mother would come home soon. And now look what had happened. Look where he was now.

He stepped into the dark room and crawled onto the bed and smelled his mother's pillow for a while. He listened to the shouts outside, the pounding of doors and rattling of windows. If it weren't for all the noise, and for his heart going crazy in his chest and the pain in his stomach and his jiggling leg and the tears running down the sides of his face into his ears, he might have been able to take a nap.

Since becoming a good person and improving his behavior was down the tubes for today, he got up and snooped around in the closet looking for Tropical Night Tropical Night or or A Stranger Comes Calling A Stranger Comes Calling or, he hoped, or, he hoped, l.u.s.t on the Moors l.u.s.t on the Moors. He wanted to do a quick read of some of the good parts, to cheer himself up, but the books were gone. All of them. He looked in the lamp table and under the bed, wondering if she took all the books with her, if it meant somehow she wasn't coming back, and the pain in his stomach got stronger. He went through his mother's drawers, the tears really coming now, and for one second and one second only thought about trying on her underwear.

He heard a sc.r.a.ping noise and a shriek, which he figured was somebody falling off the ladder. He went into the Big Girls' room and looked out the window. Most of them were still attacking the house, but a few of the little ones had lost interest and were throwing rocks at Dwight Eisenhower. After a minute somebody saw him and shouted, "There he is!" and they all looked up at the same time like a bunch of monkeys tangled in a net.

Just look at them: Aunt Beverly with her witchy-woman stare turned on full blast (which was having no effect on him whatsoever), the bucktoothed Sasquatch in his dumb DAD hat with his mouth hanging open, Aunt Nola having her fifth or sixth hot dog, Aunt Trish looking as mysteriously beautiful as the Comanche Bride, and all the kids laughing and jostling, having the time of their lives.

As much as Rusty hated to say it, these were not vampires, these idiots were his family. They were his family and they were the reason he wasn't at this very moment doing the Honk Job at the Skate Palace. They were why he was being held against his will at Old House. They were why he sat by himself at the cafeteria in school. They were why the kids in his cla.s.s had started calling him Piggy the Plyggy, and ruined his self-esteem. They were why he was mad all the time. They were why his mother had a nervous breakdown and disappeared. And they were why he was not the good and nice and honest and handsome person he was supposed to be.

He opened the window, he had something to tell them, but right away they started yelling at him.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"You're a dead man!"

"Ree-pul-seeee-vo!"

"Open the door or we're calling the sheriff sheriff!"

"You're ruining the party!" (To which Rusty replied in a whispered voice only he could hear, "Am I? Am I really really?") "Hurry, I gotta use the bathroom!"

Rusty looked down at them sadly. He shook his head. He said, "Forgive them, for they know not what they do."

He didn't know why he said this, only that it was what a good person who was trying to improve his behavior might say. He could have shouted at them the phrase Old Man Ridnour with the eye patch used to yell at them from his front porch when they walked home on their way from the bus stop, Gaze, you sons-a-b.i.t.c.hes, gaze! Gaze, you sons-a-b.i.t.c.hes, gaze! He could have thrown things out the window at them, such as Aunt Nola's wigs or all their toothbrushes or Pauline's new bras, or maybe he could have pretended to toss Cooter out the window, just to hear them gasp. But he didn't do any of these things. He was going to tell them something. He was going to tell them that he was sorry. That it had been just a big birthday joke, no hard feelings. He was tired of fighting Aunt Beverly, tired of fighting everyone. He was going to tell them that he was sorry and that he was going to try harder to be a good person and improve his behavior, but just as he was clearing his throat and swallowing back the tears that were rising again, Parley and Nephi, who had finally managed to get the window open with their screwdriver, tackled him from behind. He could have thrown things out the window at them, such as Aunt Nola's wigs or all their toothbrushes or Pauline's new bras, or maybe he could have pretended to toss Cooter out the window, just to hear them gasp. But he didn't do any of these things. He was going to tell them something. He was going to tell them that he was sorry. That it had been just a big birthday joke, no hard feelings. He was tired of fighting Aunt Beverly, tired of fighting everyone. He was going to tell them that he was sorry and that he was going to try harder to be a good person and improve his behavior, but just as he was clearing his throat and swallowing back the tears that were rising again, Parley and Nephi, who had finally managed to get the window open with their screwdriver, tackled him from behind.

27.

FOR THE PLEASURE OF SENSUAL LIVING