Emily's Seams
Chapter 14: Gifts come in Plastic Baggies

I went into Julia’s room and found her dusty collection of board games. Scrabble, Yahtzee and Trivial Pursuit were all coming with me. I grabbed one of the many decks of cards that Jude picked up at casinos and headed out the door.

The day was bright and the sky was blue. It was one of those days that was impossible to waste because no matter where you were, it was beautiful.

As I made the long trek to Creekside, my thoughts wandered back to dinner. Rabbit stew is surprisingly good and Robert had been...perfect. He didn’t ask me anything I couldn’t answer. By the end of the night I had felt myself wanting him to ask. Ask me why I wasn’t a grad student, ask me why I had flipped out in the lab, ask me why I was always alone. But he didn’t. The seams that held together my fragile disguise were breaking down, thread by thread, and he had been good enough not to mention it.

The little hospital in the forest clearing looked like an island in the middle of a sea, just begging to be overtaken. I wondered how long it could possibly sit there, forgotten.

I didn’t have to see him to know that Angus was outside of the white room. A cloud of blue smoke billowed out from the room that served to hide their strange corner of the universe.

“Hey cowboy. How’s it going?”

He barely shrugged. “Not bad. A couple of kids came through here last night, smoking dope and getting mighty happy about their lot in life. They discussed some interesting things. It was almost better than TV.” Each word had an effortless way about it. Any one of his words completely carried his swagger and ease and I-could-give-a-shit attitude. I’d never met anyone like him and my awe of this long gone man was renewed every time I saw him.

“Yeah, I bet. I brought some stuff for you guys. I figured you might be getting bored of eating so I brought a deck of cards and some board games. I don’t know, I think they’re boring as shit but then again a couple of marbles and bottle caps would spice this place up, so you know...”

No approval. Or disapproval. He just took another long drag of his cigarette.

“How you doing for those?” I asked.

“Supply is holding steady, thank you.” He gently butted out the cigarette and lovingly tucked it away. “Shall we?”

I nodded.

Angus stood in front of the wall but nothing happened. I was about to ask if something was wrong when he turned back to me. “Emily, why’d you want to know?”

“What?”

“About us. You said you wanted to know about how we died, see if you could find a pattern. Why would you want to know something like that?”

I hadn’t expected that. “I...uh...was just curious. I mean, how many times in a life do you run into this sort of shit! I wanted to know just because.”

He looked at me like I was full of shit. Because I was. He turned back to the wall without a word and suddenly it began to peel away.

It hit me the second I looked at them. Doug and Francine were different. They seemed brighter. Like actually brighter. It was like wearing some funny pair of glasses that bent the light about them.

How they acted was different too, but that could have just been in contrast to the moping of Dolly. She snivelled as I told her I hadn’t found anything yet.

“It’s okay, guess I just wasn’t meant to know.”

I couldn’t believe that I was falling for this. “Hey, I’ll keep looking. They were easy to find out about because they died so much more recently.”

She sighed and nodded glumly.

I couldn’t help but agree with her. Something had changed for Francine and Doug, something good. Knowing had made them happy somehow.

Even talking to them was better. I don’t know how long I had been sitting there and I would have continued to if it weren’t for Angus.

“I was just outside, Em. It’s getting dark so unless you want to bunk out here I suggest you get a move on,” he said.

I nodded and stood up from their white table. “See you guys later. Hey, Dolly? I promise I’ll keep looking.”

Dolly did her best impression of putting on a brave front and smiled.

Angus already had the wall open for me and was waiting.

“Can’t wait to see me go, eh?”

He shrugged.

“Hey, don’t forget, you invited me in here,” I said.

His face softened a little and he nodded. “Yep, that I did.”

My hands were shoved into my pockets as I stepped through the wall. Made the cold tingling less creepy. My fingers curled around something plastic and crunchy. I stepped back into the white room and pulled it out. I couldn’t help but start laughing.

“What’s that you got there?” Angus asked.

“Here.” I put it in his hand. “Have fun with these. Let me know if you want some more, I’ve got a man in the know.”

I jumped through the wall and turned just in time to see Angus open the clear plastic baggie and take a big whiff of the two joints I had bought nearly a week ago.

“That was dope, wasn’t it?”

It was Sunday and Angus was waiting for me outside the white room.

“Yeah, thought you might want to give it a try. Liven things up.”

He chuckled. “Is that supposed to be a joke?”

I thought about what I had just said and saw the pun. I hated puns. “No, I…whatever. How was it?”

“It was interesting to say the least. Ready to come in?” He was already putting his cigarette away.

“Yeah. How’s Dolly doing?”

Angus sighed. “About as good as yesterday. I wish you’d hurry up and find something.”

“It’s not like I haven’t been looking! Christ, it’s not just a matter of running to city hall.”

“You found out about Franny and Doug easy enough.” he shot back.

“Yeah, they haven’t been dead for thirty years! I’m looking, okay? What’s it to you anyway? You didn’t want to me to even dig in the first place?”

He was about to say something when it caught at the back of his throat. I could see him swallow the words. “Come on, I’m sure they’re just dying to see you.”

“Oh fuck off, Angus.”

He stopped just short of the wall and turned back to me. If I’d ever had a dad around to piss off to the point of considering beating my ass, I’m pretty sure he would’ve had the same look Angus had now.

But the cowboy played it cool. He turned away from me and my lame attempt at insulting him.

I considered just leaving, but through the open wall I could see Francine and Doug shuffling about happily and Dolly slumped at their little white table.

“Hey guys, how’s it going?”

Francine turned to me and beamed. She looked different again. Like she was thinner and happier. “Emily! Come on over and have a sit beside me! What’s new since yesterday?”

I couldn’t help but smile back at her. “Not much, Francine. You look...amazing.”

She smiled brightly. “Yeah, I don’t know what the hell’s going on but I feel great. Like it’s all starting again.”

Doug took a chair across from me and he looked like he had grown younger by about ten years. “Wow, Doug. You look...thin.”

He chuckled and held up the deck of cards I had brought them yesterday. “Poker?”

I nodded. Dolly was slumped beside me and had been whimpering since I sat down.

“Hey, Dolly. You want to play?”

She buried her face in her folded arms and sobbed no.

“Dolly, I’m still looking. Honestly. We’ll find something, even if I have to go to Las Vegas myself and dig you up. I’ll figure it out.”

She peeked out from her arms. Her eyes were red and watery. “Really?”

“Yeah, really. Look, maybe you can help me out. Is there anything you remember? Like, what club were you working at, any friends you had. Anything?”

Her big doll eyes looked thoughtfully at her hands as she kneaded them together awkwardly. “Big Jimmie was my boss. Tula Bing was the bartender. But for the life of me I can’t remember anything else!” She was going to start sobbing again.

“That’s really helpful. Don’t worry, I’ll figure it out. You don’t remember the name of the club do you?”

“Yeah, it was just called Big Jimmie’s. Kind of a dive but I was working my way up to one of the big casinos.” This distant memory of her ambition seemed to perk her up a bit.

“Okay, that really helps Dolly.”

She smiled brightly and wiped away her tears. If she’d been made of something other than...soul, her heavy makeup would have smeared right off.

After one game, I decided to leave. Doug and Francine were easy to be around but Angus was like a shadow that kept moving out of the corner of my eye and Dolly was just miserable. Plus, I didn’t really understand Texas Hold ’em anyways. “Hey, I know I haven’t been here long but I should go. It was starting to get dark when I got here and I don’t want to be creeping through the woods at night.” I said.

Angus walked me to the wall and stepped out with me. “That’s a big hunk of bullshit you fed me the other day about you just being curious. Cats are curious. Snot nosed kids are curious, and you ain’t either.”

“Look, I just wanted to know. Doesn’t look like Francine and Doug really minded that much finding out the truth.” My voice came out stronger than I had expected. I didn’t like talking about Julia, not to anyone, and Angus was pushing me dangerously close to doing it.

“No, I suppose you’re right. They don’t seem to mind one bit.” he answered cautiously.

“I’ll come back tomorrow. Any special orders?”

He shook his head. “No, we don’t need anything.”

I couldn’t help but feel as though what he really just said was that We don’t need you.

Jude was asleep as usual when I got home. The television set was blaring about some new ridiculous blanket that fits like a robe.

“Then just buy a fucking robe.” I muttered to myself as I turned off the TV.

Mr. Puggums protested weakly from my aunt’s lap.

“You weren’t watching that anyways, Puggums,” I said as I scratched his bony back. He purred like a bunch of pennies rattling around an old tin can.

The cat got up and jumped down from my aunt’s lap. She shivered from the sudden loss of heat when I noticed that the living room window was wide open. I closed that and threw an old blanket over my aunt before returning to my room. Mr. Puggums followed me in.

I looked at my sleeping computer for a minute before finally turning it on. Angus’s sharp disapproval of what I was doing had given my brain something to gnaw at and feel bad about.

I wanted to know how they died so I could have some idea about where Julia might be. I wasn’t religious in the slightest but I couldn’t shy away from the idea that maybe some higher being had decided that Julia had really fucked up and was now punishing her for it. I mean, if Angus and the others were right and that white room was purgatory, and Julia was in a room like that somewhere...

Then what?

I had no clue how I’d found the Creekside spooks. I couldn’t possibly stumble upon Julia and even if I did what could I even do for her? Bring her grape slushies and penny candies?

My computer finally beeped to life. It was old but it still ran and I was not a material person as of late. It wasn’t like I didn’t want a new computer or nicer clothes, I just really didn’t even think about it.

Big Jimmie’s, Las Vegas. With the speed of light Google got me more than I needed. There were ten listings for Big Jimmie’s in Las Vegas alone.

“Get some fucking originality,” I muttered to myself. I pulled out a notepad and my cell. I didn’t know what to ask but there was nowhere else to start except hi, anyone remember Dolly?

The first number rang and rang. The second was answered by a woman with a nasal voice and a thick Jersey lick to her words. She hadn’t heard of Moira or Dolly. Same thing with the next two numbers. The fifth number had no one who spoke English on the other end, the sixth and seventh were disconnected, the eighth and ninth didn’t have anyone around that recognized the name and the tenth was a pizza joint. I knew it was a long shot. The place she’d worked at was probably a Starbucks by now.

I’d been on the phone for about forty minutes already. In research you get used to getting nowhere fast but I was a little pissed about my lack of progress here. I paced around my room for a few minutes before I noticed that my phone was blinking. I had a message waiting.

It was Robert. My stomach dropped as I listened to his awkward message. He wanted to hang out if I wasn’t busy. I was already dialling him back before I had decided what to say.

“Emily!”

My brain ran through the pitch and tempo of my name and tried to glean some hidden message from it all. Was he surprised I called? Maybe even happy?

“I’m glad you got my message. I’m just sitting around and wanted to know if you were up for hanging out. We could go see a movie?” His invitation hung out there, vulnerable.

“Uh, yeah. That’d be great. Which movie did you have in mind?”

“I don’t know. Uh, I can come get you and maybe while I’m on my way over you could have a look through the listings?”

Normally I would have berated him for this. Why would he suggest going to the movies if he didn’t have one in mind. But then I realized that normally I wouldn’t even have said yes.

“Sure, call me when you’re downstairs.”

“Great! I’ll see you in a bit.”

I just let Dumb Emily have this one. I wanted to see Robert again.

“There’s really nothing playing at all,” I said as I slid into the front seat.

“Oh. We could just get some coffee then?”

“Yeah, sure. That sounds good. There’s a coffee shop just over on sixth.”

“Oh yeah, I like that one.”

I hated it. But I hated most things. “Hey, I’ve actually been inside most of the day.” Lie. “Would you mind if we got the coffee to go?”

“Sure, sounds good. Where’d you want to go? It’s pretty warm tonight, we could go down to the beach?”

“Yeah. That’d be kind of perfect actually.”

He looked at me and smiled. I felt my mouth attempt an awkward twist of its own but I’m sure I just looked insane.

Huntsville was on an inlet. The sea air without the open winds felt amazing. I hadn’t been down to the beach in years.

We hopped along the rocky shore until we came to a small clearing of perfect, soft sand. It wasn’t even wet. I hadn’t noticed but Robert had tucked a blanket under his arm. He laid it out and emptied his pockets.

“What’s all this?” I said as I kneeled down beside him. Tiny candy bars and mini-packs of licorice and jujubes were scattered across the blanket.

“I thought we were going to the movies. I never like what they have there.”

In spite of myself, I was liking Robert more and more.

“And the blanket?”

He looked at me for a second like I had said something that didn’t quite make sense and then his eyes got wide. “No! Oh, Em, I didn’t....no, that’s not why I brought it, I swear!”

I smiled at him and it came easily. “I’m just giving you a hard time.”

He seemed to calm down and ease a little. “Finally get you to hang out with me and I make you think I’m some sort of pervert.”

“Why would wanting to have sex with me make you a pervert?”

He stopped short of answering.

Now it was my turn to backtrack. “I mean, I’m not saying you do or anything, just that if you did it wouldn’t make you sick.”

“I do.”

“What?”

“I do want you, but that’s not why I brought the blanket.” He looked off to the side as he said it.

“Oh.” I didn’t think about the words before they came out. “I want you too.”

He snapped his head towards me. I could hear him breathing and my own heart thumping. My head was light and all I could do to keep from passing out was to anchor myself to him. I pulled him towards me and clumsily kissed him. I didn’t know what I was doing but between the two of us a rhythm was found and all the awkward moments were gone. Under the piles of ill fitting sweaters and ugly shirts was a smooth, hard chest and a pair of strong arms that wrapped around me. As if we’d never get another chance at it, our hands ran over each other’s bodies, learning the curves and angles of one another.

“I’m already in love with you, Emily.” he whispered.

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