“Ohmygod, Tracey, what happened?”
Mary-Lou stared in horror at the face that peered at her round the bedroom door. It was covered in blotches and sores, the red hair broken and spikey. Like Ronald MacDonald’s wig.
Tracey stuck out a hand and yanked her friend inside, closing the door and locking it behind her. Then she held out the same hand, snapping the fingers impatiently.
“Where is it?” she said.
May-Lou took the note from her purse and handed it over.
“What’s wrong?” she said. “What’s the matter with you?”
Tracey ignored her, scanning the note avidly. Her eyes had taken on an unnatural brightness. In the half-light filtering from the outside, she looked slightly demented. And when she looked up, a smile of glee transforming her already transformed features, she looked even more so.
She caught the expression of Mary-Lou’s face and she bridled.
“What are you looking at me like that for?” she snarled.
“You look…I mean…have you seen yourself in the mirror lately?”
Tracey moved to the dressing-table and whipped off the sheet. Even she was taken aback by the image that confronted her. She was gross. Like a great overstuffed sofa. Her face, where it wasn’t covered in zits, was puffy and raw, her hair an absolute mess. The spot on her nose was enormous now, the pulsing head a delicate shade of green. As she put a hand up to touch it, it burst, spraying pus. She grabbed a tissue and wiped away the residue. Then she replaced the sheet and pulled the curtains.
“It’s nothing,” she said, grabbing Mary-Lou’s hand before she could switch on the lights. “Just some allergy thing.”
Mary-Lou shook her off, taking a couple of steps back.
“It’s not contagious, is it?” she said.
“Of course it’s not contagious,” snorted Tracey. “I just told you. It’s an allergy.”
“To what?”
“How would I know? To stupid Lori Morrison, probably.”
Mary-Lou looked at her, strangely.
“You know, it’s sort of sick.”
“What is?”
“It’s…it’s like you’ve changed places. I mean, she looks great and you look…not so great,” she finished, lamely.
“I said something was going on,” said Tracey, triumphantly. “Something right off the wall. But did anybody listen to me?” She narrowed her amber eyes, sunken now in folds of flesh. “Maybe she’s put a spell on me? You know? The evil eye.”
“The evil eye?”
Tracey snapped her fingers as though she’d just discovered something blindingly obvious. “Sure. Of course. She’s a witch.”
“A witch?” squeaked Mary-Lou.
“A witch,” Tracey nodded her head. Strands of hair floated away from her scalp and fell about her shoulders like confetti. “She’s concocted some kind of a spell to make herself beautiful and me ugly. To give her that voice. And she’s slipped Perry a love potion.”
Mary-Lou was at a loss for words. Not only had Tracey lost her cool and her looks, she was apparently also losing her mind.
“Have you seen a Doctor?” she said, changing the subject.
“The only person I’ve seen is the Sheriff,” said Tracey, crossly. “He wouldn’t take no for an answer. I hid under the covers and drew the curtains, said I had a headache. And I didn’t look so bad then.”
“You ought to see somebody, Tracey. Get some…” Mary-Lou gazed at the zits in disgust. “Some ointment or something.”
“I’m not seeing anybody until this dies down.” Tracey grabbed Mary-Lou’s wrist again, hissing into her face. “And if you tell anybody, anybody at all, what I look like right now, I promise you by all that’s holy that you’ll regret the day you were born.”
Mary-Lou drew back and shut her eyes, as if by even breathing the same air as Tracey, she might catch something. Her friend really looked as though she’d flipped her lid. All Mary-Lou wanted was to get out before Tracey attacked her with a nail-file or something.
“Of course I won’t say anything,” she said, shakily.
“OK. Just see you don’t.”
Tracey let her hand drop, stepped back, sat down on the bed, patting it to indicate that Mary-Lou should sit down beside her. Mary-Lou reluctantly did so, keeping as much space between her and her former idol as she could. Don’t make waves. Humour her, she thought. Then maybe she’d get out of this alive. And without contracting some horrible disease.
“So,” said Tracey. “What’s the word on the street?”
“Crazy stuff, Trace. They’ve sent Wayne’s body to the Coroner’s for a post mortem and divers have been down from the city searching the swimming hole all day. But they still haven’t found his head. And the very latest is that they’ve just discovered that old guy, you know, the drunk, Barney something? – dead too.”
“Where?”
Mary-Lou hesitated.
“In Lori Morrison’s back yard. They say he was cut up real bad.”
Tracey leapt to her feet with a whoop.
“Human sacrifice. It figures. I told you. She’s a witch.”
“Well, whatever she is,” said Mary-Lou, “they’ve taken her into the Station House. Her and Perry both. I passed them in the Police car on my way here. The Sheriff was driving. Perry had his arm round her. She looked real upset.”
“Upset? I hope she IS upset,” said Tracey. All the hatred of a woman scorned was in her voice and her eyes had taken on a maniacal glitter. “I hope they give her the third degree. I hope they clamp her in the slammer and throw away the key. I hope she gets the chair.”
Mary-Lou shrank back against the bed-post. Don’t panic, she told herself. Play it cool.
“Can I go now, Tracey?” she asked. “I promised my mom, I wouldn’t be late for supper.”
“Sure,” said Tracey, absently. “Keep me abreast of events. OK?”
“Count on it,” said Mary-Lou.
Then she let herself out of the room and clattered down the stairs as though the hounds of hell were after her.
“Take a seat, kid.”
The Sheriff looked up as Sam brought in the prisoner. He’d just taken statements from Lori Morrison and Perry Johnson. Both kids were shaken rigid by what they’d found in Marge’s back yard. No wonder. Rube didn’t feel so great himself. But Coyote seemed as cool as a cucumber. If he had killed Barney, he was some cold-blooded SOB.
“You know why you’re here, right?”
Coyote nodded, looking directly at the Sheriff with those ice-blue eyes. Eyes that always made you want to look away. Rube took a sip of his cup of coffee and grimaced. Luke-warm. He set it aside.
“Where were you about eight this evening?”
“I was in the diner. So were thirty other people. You can check.”
“Don’t worry. I intend to.”
“You going to charge me?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“On the results of this interview.”
“Barney’s death had nothing to do with me. He was my friend. Why would I want to kill him?”
Rube stood, leaned across the table, trying to re-establish his authority.
“Why does anybody kill anybody?” he said. “I was at school with Barney, I wish I had a dollar for every time I put him in the can for his own protection when he was too drunk not to set fire to himself. You should see the body,” he shuddered at the memory. “Looked like his throat been tore out by some wild animal.”
Coyote raised an eyebrow. “You think I turn into a wolf at full moon?”
Rube lost his rag.
“Listen to me you arrogant…I got two bodies in the county morgue, one without a head and one that looks like it’s been attacked by Jack the Ripper. This was a quiet town til you arrived. I don’t know what, but you got SOMETHING to do with all this. Moreover I ain’t in the mood for no lip.”
“Then read me my rights or let me go.”
“I don’t intend to do either. Consider yourself held for questioning pending further enquiries.” And he slammed out of the room.
“You charging him?” Sam asked.
“Nothing to charge him with,” seethed the Sheriff. “And he knows it. Leave him to cool his heels for a couple of hours, then let him out. Warn him not to leave town. If you need me I’ll be down the diner. Let’s just hope nobody else gets wasted before I finish my beer.”
Lori lay in her darkened room, curtains drawn against the night, holding onto her mother’s hand like a person drowning. Marge had come home early from work and as soon as Lori and Perry had come back from the Station House, had insisted that her daughter go to bed.
“You look like death, baby,” she had said.
Too true.
But Lori hadn’t wanted to go into her room on her own, had clung to her mother like a child, begging her to stay with her until she fell asleep. And Marge had agreed, telling a grumbling Ted that he could get his own supper for a change, he was big and ugly enough.
Not that Lori wanted to sleep. She was afraid to sleep. She was also afraid to stay awake. But most of all, she was afraid to be alone. The world was suddenly a very dangerous place. She’d been spooked enough before she went to the Station House. Although at least Perry had been with her. Then, just as they arrived, Sam Leroy had brought in Miguel Coyote, in hand-cuffs. He’d stared at her with those hypnotic blue eyes, as though he could see right through her. As though he knew everything that was going on. It had almost pushed her over the edge. She’d turned her face into Perry’s chest, just to get away from that stare. Thank the Lord they’d taken the biker into a holding cell while she and Perry had gone into the enquiry room to make their statements. Otherwise she might have fallen apart.
Lori felt that her whole life was collapsing around her ears. And there didn’t seem to be anything she could do about it. There was nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide. Two people were dead and it was all her fault. Hers. And HIS. Dreams come true? Nightmares, more like.
She lay in bed now, grasping her mother’s hand like a lifeline, wishing that she’d never seen the Dreamcatcher. She hadn’t had time to retrieve it from the drawer downstairs, but she could feel its lowering presence in the room, knew the minute that she was on her own he would appear, smirking and making some sick remark about Barney’s death, as though it was some huge private joke that they shared.
Once or twice, when she’s almost dozed off, she’d felt him hovering and had shaken herself awake again. Once she’d even tried to broach the subject with her mom. But just as she was about to start, she saw a dark shadow beginning to form on the other side of the room, a darker stain on the darkness, and she’d changed her mind and the stain had faded out again.
Anyway, who would believe her? Who could she tell apart from her mom? Perry? The Sheriff? They’d think she was crazy. Anybody would. Maybe she WAS crazy? All she knew for sure was that Wayne and Barney were dead and that somehow, she was responsible.
Lori’s eyelids began to droop. She was tired. So tired. Shattered really. She’d been living on her nerves all weekend. All the good things that had happened. Some very good things. Then all the bad things. Some very very bad things. And nobody to turn to. She yawned, drifting into semi-consciousness. And then, just as she was about to sink into oblivion, a thought flashed into her head out of left field.
Except maybe the biker? What if he wasn’t the enemy after all? What if he could somehow get her out of this mess?
A jolt, like a surge of electricity, shot through her body.
“Don’t even go there,” said the voice in her head.
Lori started to cry then, small whimpering sounds, half panic, half despair. She was lost. Fame and fortune and size eight and Perry. She would give them all up for a bit of peace and quiet. And to have Wayne and Barney alive again.
“Too late now,” said the voice in her head and she snapped her eyes open and dug her nails into her mother’s palm.
“Don’t leave me, will you, Mom?” she pleaded. Just as she pleaded with him not to leave her, when was it? Only last night? And what had he said?
“Never,” said the voice in her head. “I said ‘never’. After all – a deal is a deal.”
Marge stroked Lori’s forehead, slick with cold sweat. And Lori looked up at her with a kind of hopelessness, great tears welling in her eyes and running down her cheeks, damp-staining the pillow beneath her head.
“Don’t worry, baby,” said Marge, who was worried to death. “I won’t leave you. I promise.”
Lori closed her eyes again, couldn’t keep them open, trying to close her ears and her brain at the same time against any incoming signals.
“Thanks,” she whispered, miserably.
“Don’t mention it,” said Marge, squeezing her hand. “That’s what moms are for.”
And Lori, exhausted beyond belief, finally succumbed to sleep.