David Bart is a writer and consultant living in New Mexico. His work has appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, with one of his stories reprinted in a French anthology, Histoires d’homicides a domicile, published in Paris. His short fiction also appears in the MWA anthology Show Business is Murder. He says, “I enjoy writing from a woman’s point of view because they have more accessible sensibilities than men, and can be believably portrayed as intelligent and resourceful even while displaying inadequacies many of us share. ‘Prom Night’ has its origins in an aggregation of overheard conversations and private exchanges with women on the edge who eventually came to terms with difficult circumstances and bravely moved on.”
Kylie frowned at the ghostly reflection in the fogged mirror, shaking her head at her thoughts: Figures...air-conditioning’ s broke, weather guy’ s going off on how it’ s the hottest damn day in a decade, perfect night for a date...be all hot and sweaty. Very attractive.
She wiped the steamy glass with a washcloth, her slowly clearing image reminding her of some teenybopper primping for the prom: starry-eyed young thing wondering if that study hall note from Sally or Pam about Bobby giving her his class ring was really true, and would he get his father’s car so they could go to the dance in style? Would he try to get fresh? Would she let him?
Would you just shut up?
The woman looking back at Kylie from the mirror was well past high school; wrinkles fanning out from the corners of her green eyes, another collection at the corners of the mouth: a topography of her life, representing every disappointment, hurt feeling, betrayal, broken promise, shattered dream, and cruel intent she’d endured in her thirty-eight years. As a matter of fact, she remembered, it had started on a prom night; persuasiveness of backseat promises ultimately resulting in her being a teenage mother, her baby girl in college now, though—dean’s list, eye on the prize. Hopefully staying out of backseats.
Kylie stared at her streaked reflection. Managed not to weep.
Everything sagged; perky breasts were a vague memory, though still ample enough to attract more attention from men at the office than she really wanted...hips so wide they had separate area codes, though she knew they weren’t as bad as they looked to her. Kylie was aware she was like a lot of women, quick to trivialize her good points and even quicker to find defect in some feature less than extraordinary.
Was that the doorbell?
Kylie Baumer turned away from her pathetically hopeful scare, ran barefoot and nearly naked out of the bathroom and across the hall, hands covering and holding her breasts secure as she jogged across the darkened living room to the draped window next to her front door. Peeked through a tiny opening.
Nobody out there, nothing in the glowing patch of yellow light from the porch lamp other than a few moths doing what moths do; it had just been performance anxiety evoking the sound of doorbells. Because that’s what a date is, a performance.
God, it’s hot. Why in hell do we girls put ourselves through all this? she wondered as she headed back toward the bathroom, noticing that even the invigorating chill of the tile floor had abandoned her, the floor warm beneath her bare soles.
She shivered anyway, though she figured the trembling to be a kind of middle-age angst, a sort of pre-geriatric apprehension. That would be Tracy’s fault; because just that morning by the copy machine Tracy’d been telling her, “He’s just what you’ve been looking for, girl—and time’s a-wastin’, we ain’t gettin’ any younger—hey, if he’d come onto me a month ago, I’d keep him for myself, but Alec and I are getting along, so this guy is all yours.”
“No way,” Kylie’d told her frizzy-haired friend while taking her turn at the copier, duplicating and collating the report Crapnoggin wanted by three o’clock. Craig Nugent was her boss’s name; Crapnoggin was just her label for him. No modern-day sexual harassment from Nugent; he made his subordinates’ lives hell the old-fashioned way: yelling, screaming, threatening termination, and tectonic mood shifts.
“Yes, ‘way,’” Tracy had insisted. “I know you like the intellectual type, and this guy’s a real brain,” glancing at the two other girls waiting to use the copier, a gleam in her eye.
Kylie knew Tracy was putting her on; around the office they believed her a little slow, but it was just that she was always so uptight worrying about what people thought of her that sometimes she’d get confused. Her dad had told her on a daily basis how stupid she was, saying, “If brains were free, you’d be too dumb to get any.” It took her until all the way through high school and two years community college to realize it was her dad who was not too swift, that she was much smarter than he. Still, his mocking tone followed her around even today, presenting as self-doubt.
Her mirrored reflection sternly admonished her as she turned on the tap. “Just have a good time, Baumer, don’t get all worked up, imagining this is going to be Mr. Right or some knight in shining armor or something. Anyway; been there, saw that, got the black eyes to prove it—and divorce papers, bruised ribs, broken heart.” Need she go on?
Her reflection shook its head.
Kylie bent forward and washed makeup off her hands. Noticed a chip in the polish on her left thumbnail; it’s what she got for being so damn nervous. But every little flaw adds up, she thought, reaching for the cabinet knob to get at the polish.
Doorbell again?
No, the phone. She picked up the remote handset. It was on no-ring; she’d heard the one in the kitchen. “Hello.”
“Is he good-looking or what?” the female voice inquired. Her daughter, Sarah, calling from her dorm, no doubt.
Kylie pictured her red-haired daughter fingering the silver antique cross she’d given her for high school graduation, something Sarah always did when on the phone. “Not here yet, honey. What time’s your game?’’ Kylie asked, cradling the phone on her shoulder and holding it there with her chin.
A sigh. “Boys can be such boys,” her daughter replied.
“What happened, Sarah?”
“The effect? He didn’t show up. The cause? Hell, who knows. Maybe he finally noticed I’m a little light in the boob department or decided he didn’t like smart girls or redheads or someone who uses utensils when they eat. Since he didn’t call to cancel, I didn’t even get an excuse.”
“Did you like him?” Kylie asked.
“Just met him...but I sure don’t like the shithead now.”
The bitterness in her daughter’s voice disturbed her. A little concern wouldn’t hurt right now, she thought, plus it might be a way out of this damn anxiety. “Why not drive up here? I’ll beg off this date,” she said.
“No way, Jose. You need to get out. Anyway, I don’t feel like anything but maybe some Austen and the heavily laden pizza that’s about to arrive.”
Kylie’d never been able to get all the way through one of Jane Austen’s stories, though she enjoyed the romantic aspects. She liked crime novels better. “You sure you’re all right?”
Her daughter snorted softly. “Mother, if I got upset every time some guy disappointed me, I’d be gulping Prozac instead of pizza and beer. I’m fine, just wanted to see what this dude looked like, but you can call me in the morning—after ten though, I plan to eat a large, triple cheese pizza all by myself, and the narcotic effect of all that mozzarella marinated in beer might keep me unconscious till nine or after.”
“Honey, I think that’s the door. Call you in the morning. Love you!”
“Me, too, Mom. Have a blast, but don’t elope; I know you can be impulsive.”
Laughing, Kylie punched the power button on the handset and put it on the counter...listened harder. Nothing—imagination again. Dried her hands, thinking, Hell, girl, the only ding-dong in this house is right here in that fogged mirror. Kylie Baumer, getting ready for prom night. Yeah, right.
But after hanging the towel on the rack, she glanced over at her reflection, which seemed to be frowning contentiously, something inside her saying Wait a minute, dammit, so I want this to be prom night, what in holy hell’s wrong with that?
Kylie sighed, wishing just once in her life, inside her mind, she could be in agreement with herself.
She thought back to that morning and how Tracy hadn’t stopped at just telling her this dude was just what Kylie was looking for; no way, she had to describe him, for Christ’s sake. Dark blond hair and mustache. Dark blue eyes. “Kinda like Robert Redford as Sundance,” her friend had promised, adding, “a lopsided smile lets you know he’s interested, but maybe a little craz—”
This time it is the bell.
Flitting across the ceramic floor, bare feet slapping the warm tile like tentative applause, quickly over the soft living room carpet to right up beside the window, hand reaching for the drapes—her mother’s voice coming from somewhere behind other mildly unpleasant memories, telling her not to be seen like that, looked like she was eager, for heaven’ s sake.
Kylie peered out through an opening in the drapes. Yep, somebody’ s there. The porch light illuminated a tall, thin man, looking around like he’s lost, tiny beads of perspiration on his forehead.
Had to be a really hot night. Christ, I’ll be sweating like a pig, too, she thought, sighing.
Don’t use the Lord’s name in vain, Kylie, her mother’s voice admonished as Kylie continued to look at her guest through the opening. Brown hair, not dark blond...couldn’t make out the eyes, could be blue, could be chartreuse for all she could see. And he must have shaved the mustache; she was sure Tracy’d said he had a “cool” mustache. But damn, are those work clothes, for Christ’s sake? (Blasphemy, daughter!)
Kylie ignored her mother’s nagging, wondering, Doesn’t anybody dress up anymore? Jeez, her black cocktail dress will look silly next to Mr. Green Jeans out there.
She took a breath before speaking loudly. “Just a minute, I’m running late—be just a second,” watching the guy flinch, head jerked around to face the door, flinging a drop of sweat off the tip of his nose. Staring at the peephole.
And Kylie projected into her suitor’s mind as she headed back to the bathroom: Well, bitch, which is it, a minute or a second? Goddamn hot out here. Yeah, rudeness wouldn’t surprise her either—been there, done that-
Back in front of the mirror, a quick check after applying lipstick...smoothed out the pancake glop a little more (Too much, honey, you’ll look like poor white trash) and running across the hall, through the living room and into her gorgeously humongous bedroom, over to her four-poster with canopy, thinking how she always knew she’d someday have a huge bedroom to make up for that square closet she shared with two sisters as a kid.
On the bed lay the little black dress, low-cut and sexy: cleavage city. Smiling as she thought, Good thing about having a few extra pounds on the ol’ frame is it can fill you out in places that matter.
’Course, Mr. Green Jeans out there will probably drool, say something crude about her boobs—Jesus, blind dates—and hell, the way he’s dressed, maybe she should wear chinos and a sweatshirt and tell him in a starry-eyed way how fascinating his recitation of baseball statistics is. Great cologne; didn’t know Kmart carried it, blah, blah, blah.
But old habits and battered self-esteem compelled her to shimmy the slinky black dress down over her head, letting it fall silently in place—glanced at the little Sony sitting on the armoire. Its sound was off, but the picture glowed colorfully: patches of pale green in the beige savannah, impossibly blue African sky. National Geographic Special; female lion lunging from high tan grass, soundlessly bringing down and killing a small gazelle. Poor thing.
Turn the TV off before you leave, goddammit; I’m not made of money. Her father ‘s whiny voice. Long dead now.
“Just one second—I’m sorry!” she shouted in the general direction of the front door, slipping on hateful high heels. (Don’t shout, honey, not ladylike.) Mom again.
All these voices careening around in her mind, even Tracy getting in on the act, Kylie remembering her saying this morning, “We like the same kind of guy; you’ll love him.” They were the same age, just a month apart. Tracy’s birthday was today, September 24. Tracy telling her, “He’s my gift to you for your next birthday. What’d you get me for mine?”
Kylie grabbed the thin strap of her silver purse, but it slipped through her fingers and fell to the floor. She scooped it up on the move, jogged to the front door, and leaned forward to look through the peephole. (Don’t do that, Kylie, he’ll see you being rude. Don’t worry about him; he’s a fine, handsome young man.)
No argument there, Mom, she thought, her mind racing ahead through the evening, deciding that if this guy was decent and even a little fun and she found him marginally human, then what the hell, it’s been a long time.
Swinging the door wide open, she gave him a high voltage smile just in case he’s deserving of it—could always take it back. Damp feeling of perspiration had gathered in mutinous patches of moistness under her arms, at the small of her back and—
Well, hell, first impression was certainly an OK deal, though his hair was dull brown, not dark blond with sun streaks and—hazel eyes? Goddamn good-looking though, and she smiled openly, gratefully. (Not the Lord’s name, Kylie—please.)
Smiling even wider, she took in his handsome face—every detail-and told her guest that she’s Kylie, Tracy’s friend, and he must be Adam and my, he sure looked familiar...
She chastised herself, Oh, yeah, right—now ask him his horoscope sign, goofy. Something in her mind collided with something emotional, and before she could quell the confusion she blurted, “What’s your si—?” cutting herself off, face reddening and a champagne feeling of bubbling embarrassment rising through her nose into her—
—empty goddamn head, what’s wrong with you, Baumer?
Her guest moved as though to enter—jerkily, the semblance of a smile on his face, but not really a smile.
(He’s just shy, Kylie, you be nice, or the boys won’t like you.) She frowned, wishing her mother would shut up and a tad startled by his sudden proximity—so surprised she stepped out of the way, teetering on the high heels, stumbled on the footstool, lost her balance, and fell over the ottoman to the floor-scalding embarrassment of galactic proportions washed over her as a self-destructive wish flashed through her mind...then an image of her ex-husband laughing and pointing.
Blinking, her face feeling as if she was looking in a furnace door, Kylie struggled to reorient herself...became peripherally aware of the little Sony in her bedroom-a stabilizing, familiar object-she turned to look at the same ol’ screen she’d watched a million times, the picture glowing brightly. National Geographic was over, and it was the Channel 13 news, some talking head giving viewers the skinny.
Damn, you forgot to turn it off. Are you as stupid as you look? Her father, posthumously worried about electricity bills. Hell, even if he’d been there, still alive, he wouldn’t notice his oldest daughter had just fallen to the floor, suffering bruised pride and a slightly twisted ankle.
Her attention was wholly captured by the tiny screen—reporter’s face was gone, and there’s that serial killer the cops are looking for—murdered nine girls the past two years in and around the Twin Cities. Stabbed and mutilated. They call him the Slasher. God, just like Bundy: handsome and well-groomed. At least in that police sketch.
Kylie turned her head at a noise-her suitor noisily twisting the doorknob as he closed the front door from the inside—she glanced back at the TV, then quickly back to her handsome guest. Christ, was her date for the evening that guy on the screen? It’s a police drawing, not a photo, hard to tell for sure. But that’s why he’d looked familiar earlier—she’d pretty much thought her remark to him about seeing him before had been just her own insecurities voiced as nervous banter.
Sudden as a predator’s attack, a prescient chill had its way with her spine, skittering upward on clawed little feet, creating twitching waves of icy apprehension in their wake. I’ve let a killer in the house! I’m going to die right here in my own—
Kylie felt disoriented, dizzy, as though hurtling through a dark tunnel of charred perceptions, her self-image crumbling into black, brittle remnants of some indefinable substance, her essence filtering to ground in what seemed to be the future...
It’s the office copy room with Tracy, her boss, and the other girls talking in hushed tones, not noticing the amorphous pile of dark debris on the floor that was once their coworker, Kylie Baumer. “She let the guy in without knowing him,” Tracy’s telling them, trying to hide the fact that she’d vouched for Kylie’s blind date, said she knew him and that he was a nice guy.
Nugent, her boss, nodding his crappy noggin and saying, “She was wound too tight, too needy; woman like that is just asking for trouble.”
Kylie felt her feelings magnetize suddenly, gathering around her in an ever-tightening vortex, plucking her from the copy room floor and whirling her from that imminent future back to her house.
Deposited softly, like cold ashes, on the living room carpet and just inches from where a killer was standing; dark, cruel eyes staring down at her.
Another noise outside. Someone’s footsteps on the porch. Doorbell ringing, thank God!
Her visitor quickly bent down to her, roughly lifting her to her feet beside him, Kylie feeling a sharp twinge of pain in her ankle, the guy pulling something metallic from his coat—(knight in shining armor?) she couldn’t see what it was—put his incredibly strong hand over her mouth, flicking the metal object close to her face, the menacing movement causing her to close her eyes tight . Oh, God, is it a knife?
He put his lips close to her ear, whispered something that might as well have been in another language—heard him clearly, but her mind wouldn’t process the words. Gibberish, uttered in a sibilant stream of mint-flavored breath; she could catch just a couple phrases: “—kill you—your friend Tracy.”
Felt a slight pinch on her arm—opened her eyes to see her “suitor” for the evening putting his finger to his lips—hard, cold eyes telling her that to speak would not be good. Then he nodded, looked out through the little opening in the drapes.
After a couple beats, he glanced back down into her eyes and shook his head calmly, whispering, “Not a sound, OK?”
The doorbell rang again.
Kylie blinked a couple times, her eyes stinging, thinking: Last date...ever.
Sudden scuffling sounds from outside as if someone was running down the stairs—shouts, gunfire. More shots from off a ways.
And then silence arrived so suddenly it seemed to roar.
The front door burst open, and someone rushed inside, stopped, looked at her and the man with his hand over her mouth. Kylie peered out toward the darkened yard, the body lying on her sidewalk in a sliver of yellow from the porch light. She gazed directly into the dead stare sightlessly fixed on some meaningless point in the night sky, tiny glint of orange streetlight reflecting. Police officers moved in and formed a blue forest of legs around him, and she couldn’t see his face anymore.
The dead man had dark blond hair, though, and a Sundance mustache. Just like the drawing on TV, which also matched the description of her blind date Tracy had given her that very morning.
A shiny badge flickered in Mr. Green Jeans’s hand as he put it away and gently removed his hand from her mouth. “Sorry, but I needed to keep you quiet. We had to get this guy.” Introducing himself as Detective Dylan Keegan, continuing, “Twin City Task Force has been watching your friend Tracy and other girls in the Minneapolis-Saint Paul area ever since the Quantico profiler gave us a match on victims. All had birthdays on the twenty-fourth of the month they were killed, blonde hair, in their thirties.”
Kylie heard him, but the words weren’t making a lot of sense. She tried to focus, tried to slow the whirling sensation in her head. Something snapped, and she could finally get what he was saying.
“Incredible luck, really—the operative following Tracy lost contact, and we were going around to all her friends to see if anybody knew where she’d been heading or where she was now. I spotted that guy in a van around the corner whose description matched our police sketch. Called for backup and waited. Wanted to get him on private property attempting entry so we’d have intent, though DNA would’ve probably clinched it. ’Course, courts being the way they are, you can’t be too thorough.”
Kylie just stared at him. Some goddamn suitor. A tad verbose.
“You all right, Ms. Baumer?” the detective asked, tilting his head in a way to indicate concern, like he really cared or something...and then, of course, he reached out and brushed away some perspiration from her chin with his left hand, giving her a really intriguing smile. No wedding ring.
She sighed, crossed the living room, went into her bedroom, and turned off the TV. Her thoughts were basic, wondering whether she should call Sarah tonight or wait till after ten in the morning. She’d call tonight—make her daughter feel better to know getting stood up isn’t the worst thing that can happen to you.
Kylie slowed her breathing, calming herself for a few beats more, trying to put the last few minutes into some kind of perspective, something you could explain. Gave it up...looked out at the detective, his intriguing smile reasserting itself. She again saw his ringless finger. But she was too tired to flirt. Way too tired.
Noticing he was about to speak, Kylie cut him off, saying, “Some goddamn prom night,” headed for her closet, saw out the corner of her eye he was frowning at her remark, maybe thinking she was odd or ditsy, going off about prom nights.
Whatever. So damn hot tonight. She’d hang up the dress, put on something relaxing, cool. Maybe shorts and a halter top. He wants to watch, that’s his business.