Community Read online

  Lloyd said nothing, but sat there looking at Michael and systematically swigging his beer. His face was expressionless.

  Michael pushed back his chair and stood up. ‘I should go,’ he said. ‘I never should have asked you in the first place.’

  ‘What?’ Lloyd demanded. ‘You’re trying to say that I’m chickenshit?’

  ‘No, of course not. It wasn’t fair to ask you, that’s all, but I couldn’t think of anybody else. I’ll have to work out a way of getting her out of there on my own. Maybe a wheelchair or a gurney or something like that.’

  ‘I’ll help you,’ said Lloyd.

  ‘You will? Are you sure about that?’

  ‘Sure I’m sure. What else happens in my life, apart from sitting here day after day listening to Mrs K going on about the old days, and how she dazzled all the boys, and how she used to dance until dawn. “Oh! That night at the Peacock Court! I danced until my ass dropped off!”’

  Lloyd’s imitation of Mrs Kroker was so spot-on that Michael couldn’t help smiling and shaking his head.

  ‘But what if they catch us, and kick you out of here, like you said?’

  ‘Well … I don’t know, Greg, do you honestly think that they would? Who would they find to replace me? Besides – even if they did kick me out, maybe it’s time that I did the same as you, and went back out to Reality Land.’

  ‘Lloyd!’ called Mrs Kroker, from the living room. ‘What are you up to, Lloyd? Isn’t it time for my temazepam?’

  Lloyd said, ‘Just a second, Greg.’ He stood up and went to the living-room door. ‘Me and Greg are talking football scores, that’s all. And you don’t take your temazepam till seven. I’ll fetch you a cup of tea in a minute.’

  ‘Don’t forget my ginger thins!’

  ‘Do I ever?’

  ‘Well, no, but you might this time!’

  Lloyd came back into the kitchen. ‘Jesus. I wish she had a plug, because I swear to God I’d be first in line to pull it.’

  ‘But you’ll help me?’

  ‘For sure. What time were you thinking of? Mrs K takes her temazepam at seven so she’s usually out of it by twenty after.’

  ‘Isobel’s not usually asleep till nine-thirty. Why don’t I pick you up at eleven? The clinic should be pretty much deserted by then, too.’

  Lloyd held out his hand and Michael took it.

  ‘See you round eleven.’

  As Michael was leaving, the living-room door opened and Mrs Kroker appeared, in a droopy pink nightdress, her breasts hanging as flat as two pieces of pitta bread, with her hair all in rollers.

  ‘Who’s this?’ she squawked. She looked like some species of hunchbacked monkey, with her head on one side. ‘Isn’t it time for my temazepam?’

  They ate a light supper of cold roast chicken salad, but Michael made sure that he kept on refilling Isobel’s glass with Zinfandel so that by 8:30 she had drunk more than a whole bottle.

  ‘Cheers!’ she said, as she toppled back on to the couch in the living room, raising her glass to him and blowing him a kiss.

  ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I’ll clear up the supper things. Why don’t you undress and get yourself all ready in bed?’

  ‘Yes!’ she said. ‘Why not? But you can leave the dishes till tomorrow, can’t you?’

  ‘No, you know me and my OCD. I can’t make love to you if I know that there are dirty plates still stacked in the sink.’

  ‘You’re a very strange man, Greg. You’re very, very sexy. But you’re very, very strange. You make me feel all goosebumpy.’

  ‘Well, believe me, the feeling is mutual. I still think you should see a doctor about being so cold.’

  Isobel stood up again, swaying slightly, but then she regained her balance and came right up to him. ‘I want to see Doctor Greg first of all. I’m sure Doctor Greg can warm me up.’

  He kissed her chilly forehead. ‘OK. Let me finish clearing up and I’ll be right with you.’

  She kissed him back, on the lips. ‘If you’re very good I might let you try out your thermometer.’

  She tilted her way into the bedroom. Michael waited for a moment, until he heard her stumble into the bathroom, and then he went back into the kitchen. He took his time clearing the table and rinsing the plates, whistling tunelessly to himself as he did so. He was trying to be nonchalant, but he was so tense that even his jaw was aching. He could easily forget about rescuing Natasha Kerwin. All he had to do was finish the dishes, undress and go to bed, where Isobel would be waiting for him, her legs open, polar-cold but welcoming.

  He saw himself reflected in the blackness of the kitchen window. He looked like a ghost of himself, clearing up a ghostly kitchen, out in the night. He wondered which one of them was real, or if they were both real, or neither of them.

  As he was putting away the knives that they hadn’t used tonight, he saw a pair of kitchen scissors in the cutlery drawer, and a thought occurred to him about what he was going to be doing tonight. He took out the scissors and stuck them in the back pocket of his jeans.

  When he had finished wiping the work surfaces, he folded up his dish-towel, looked around the kitchen to make sure that he had put everything away, and switched off the light. He went through to the bedroom to find Isobel already fast asleep, her clothes strewn all across the carpet.

  He leaned over the bed and whispered, ‘Isobel?’ but she didn’t even murmur.

  He looked at her for a while. It was hard to think that he would never see her again. Although she had been so physically cold, she had been an extraordinary lover, and she had become his friend, too, and that was what he would miss about her more than anything else. She had accepted him for who he was, post-traumatic amnesia and all, and made him feel that she really valued his company.

  He went into his own bedroom and took his warm black roll-neck sweater out of his closet. The rest of the few clothes that the clinic had given him he would have to leave behind. He put on his overcoat and laced up his boots, and then he took down the keys to Isobel’s Jeep. He supposed that taking her SUV was technically theft, but he proposed to leave it in some supermarket parking lot once he had put a good few miles between him and Trinity, and phone her to tell her where she could recover it.

  He went out and closed the front door very quietly behind him. Then he unlocked the Jeep and climbed into the driver’s seat. The leather was as cold as Isobel’s skin. It even smelled cold.

  He didn’t start up the engine immediately, but released the parking brake and put the gear shift into neutral so that the Jeep rolled silently backward down the sloping driveway and into the road. It was only then that he turned the key, and the engine surged into life, and he turned the wheel and headed for Mrs Kroker’s house. All the same, he didn’t switch on his lights, in case the security patrol were anywhere in the vicinity.

  Outside the community center, he turned around and stopped, flashing his headlights three times. All he could do then was sit and wait and hope that Lloyd hadn’t changed his mind.

  Five long minutes went by, and there was still no sign of Lloyd. Michael put down his window and listened. The silence was absolute. Two or three of the surrounding houses were lit up, but Michael could hear no televisions, no music, not even people talking. He could see no stars, but in the distance he could see the white cold peaks of Mount Shasta.

  He began to think that he was going to have to resort to Plan B, and rescue Natasha Kerwin on his own, although he wasn’t at all confident that he could manage it. Supposing Lloyd had been right, and he took her out of intensive care and she died, because of him?

  He shifted the Jeep into drive, and he was about to release the parking brake when the front door of Mrs Kroker’s house opened and Lloyd appeared, wearing a shiny black padded snow jacket, with the hood up. He gave Michael a wave and came jogging across the road.

  ‘Sorry to keep you waiting,’ he panted, as he climbed up into the passenger seat. ‘The old crow woke up and wanted a drink of water. But she’s zonked off ag
ain now. Once she’s had her temazepam, she sleeps like she’s gone to meet her Maker.’

  ‘You’re still sure you want to do this?’ Michael asked him.

  Lloyd clapped his hands together. ‘Raring to go, Greg! First time I’ve been out in the evening for months! Well, except for some gruesome country-and-western party, about two weeks ago. Line-dancing of the living dead.’

  They drove up the slope toward the clinic. As they approached the entrance, Lloyd said, ‘Pull in here. We don’t want Henry to see us.’

  ‘Henry?’

  ‘Henry, the gate guard.’

  ‘Oh, shit,’ said Michael. ‘I clean forgot about him. I was so busy wondering how we could explain what we were doing if they caught us inside.’

  He pulled the Jeep into the side of the road about fifty yards shy of the entrance and parked it at a tilt, with two wheels up on the snowy verge.

  ‘Don’t worry about them catching us inside,’ said Lloyd. ‘All we need to do is walk in there like we own the place. This time of night, there shouldn’t be too many people around anyhow. Mealtime’s over, and the cleaners won’t have come in yet.’

  Michael raised an eyebrow, as if to ask Lloyd how he knew so much about the clinic’s routine, but Lloyd said, ‘I used to do odd jobs for them, before they sent me down to Mrs K’s. I volunteered, as a matter of fact. I’ve never been much of a reader, except for the sports pages, and I can’t watch those fucking soaps. I was bored out of my skull, is all.’

  ‘But what do we do if this gate guard stops us from going in – what’s-his-name, Henry?’

  ‘He won’t. I used to come out here some evenings and Henry and me would play cards together and tell each other off-color jokes. I’ll tell him that I’ve come up here to pick up some new meds for Mrs K. While him and me are shooting the breeze, you sneak in behind me and I’ll meet you on the steps.’

  He didn’t give Michael any time to decide whether he went along with this plan or not, but headed off toward the security booth with a carefree swagger. Michael kept himself well back against one of the pillars to the entrance gate, watching for his moment.

  As the gate guard caught sight of Lloyd approaching, Lloyd raised one hand in salute to him. The gate guard put down the paperback that he was reading and stood up to unlock the door of the booth so that Lloyd could join him inside. Michael heard a snatch of conversation, and then the door was slammed shut.

  He could see them talking, however, and as they talked, Lloyd put his arm around the security guard’s shoulders, as if he were letting him in on some confidential gossip or telling him some really blue joke. As he did so, he half-turned him around so that he had his back to the gateway.

  Michael immediately ducked down and ran at a crouch toward the clinic’s main entrance. He hurried up the steps and hid himself behind the bay tree where he had hidden himself before, when he was watching Jack being driven away. His heart was thumping and he was sure that so much breath was billowing out from behind the bay tree that anybody could have seen him hiding there.

  While he was waiting for Lloyd to finish his banter with the security guard, he took a quick look inside the clinic’s lobby. It was deserted, without even a receptionist sitting at the front desk. It began to occur to Michael that the clinic weren’t really too hot on security, except for the white-haired, white-faced men in their sunglasses, touring the community in their black Escalade. What was more, those two seemed to be much more interested in keeping an eye on the residents and their behavior, rather than watching out for unwelcome intruders from outside.

  He was still kicking himself for not remembering the guard at the gate, especially since they would have to pass him again, on their way out of the clinic with Natasha Kerwin. There was no doubt that Henry would raise the alarm if they tried to do that, and they would obviously be walking painfully slowly. Henry might even be armed, and then they wouldn’t stand a chance.

  As he waited behind the bay tree, however, shuffling his feet and clapping his gloves together to keep warm, he began to think of a way around it – how they could escape without Henry having the chance to stop them, and without Lloyd getting the blame for helping him. By the time he heard Lloyd stepping out of the security booth, he had it all pretty much worked out.

  ‘See you later, Henry!’ Lloyd called out, and Henry called, ‘See you later, Lloyd! Super-pussy! Ha! That was a doozie!’

  Lloyd came walking across to the clinic’s front steps, while Lloyd slammed the door of his booth behind him.

  ‘Looks like there’s nobody around,’ said Michael, nodding his head toward the clinic lobby. ‘And I’ve just thought of a way that we can get out of here before they can set the dogs on us.’

  ‘What dogs?’

  ‘I’m talking metaphorically.’

  ‘Meta-what?’

  ‘Never mind. I’ll tell you once we get inside.’

  They pushed their way into the lobby. It was silent, and shiny. Not even the sound of a distant floor-polisher.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Michael. Now that he was here – now that he was actually trying to get Natasha Kerwin free – he was all fired up, and much more sure of himself than at any time since he had woken out of his coma. He still wasn’t sure what his name was, or where he came from, but he felt a rising sense of self-assurance, as if he were beginning to remember what kind of a man he was. Headstrong, perhaps, and inclined to rush into things without thinking them through, but always determined, and ready to take a risk.

  Together, he and Lloyd walked quickly down to the end of the corridor, to Natasha Kerwin’s room. He peeked in through the window and there she was, lying asleep. She was still connected to a Veris vital signs monitor, but she didn’t appear to be attached to any intravenous drips, although there was a catheter bag half-swollen with amber urine clipped to the side of her bed.

  ‘You ready?’ he asked Lloyd. ‘If we’re going to do it, we need to do it now.’

  Lloyd crossed himself.

  ‘You’re Catholic?’ Michael asked him.

  Lloyd shrugged and pulled a face. ‘Don’t ask me. I can’t remember. I’m just doing that in case I am.’

  SIXTEEN

  Michael eased open the door. Before they went in, though, they waited for a few seconds, listening. The clinic was still silent, except for the soft persistent beeping of Natasha Kerwin’s monitor. Not even the padding of feet on the carpeted floors.

  ‘OK, let’s do it,’ said Michael, and they entered the room, closing the door behind them, and approached the bed. Natasha Kerwin was lying on her back, sleeping, with two oxygen tubes up her nostrils. She looked deathly pale, and she felt so cold when Michael touched her arm that he could have believed she was dead already. Yet her chest rose and fell, and the monitor indicated that her heart was beating steadily and that her blood-pressure was 90 over 60, which was low, but not life-threatening, although Michael had no idea how he knew that.

  With a sticky crackle, he peeled off the pad on her chest, which connected her to the monitor. Then he carefully extracted the oxygen tubes from her nostrils, lifting them over her head.

  ‘What about this pee thing?’ asked Lloyd.

  Michael took the kitchen scissors out of his back pants pocket and held them up.

  ‘Good thinking,’ said Lloyd. ‘For a moment there I thought we were going to have to take it with us.’

  ‘No way. But I had one of these, when I was in here, and you don’t want anybody yanking it out of you in a hurry, believe me, even when you’re asleep. Especially if you’re asleep.’

  Michael pulled back Natasha Kerwin’s bedcovers, lifted up her pale green gown, and snipped off her catheter as short as he could.

  ‘OK – now help me sit her up,’ he said. ‘There should be a robe in that closet over there.’

  He had hoped that there might be some slippers in the closet, too, but apart from the robe and the dress in its dry-cleaning bag there was only a jumble of empty coat-hangers. At least Natasha Kerwin wa
s wearing long white surgical socks.

  She was as floppy as a toy clown, but between them Michael and Lloyd managed to shuffle her arms into the sleeves of the green toweling robe, wrap it around her and tie up the belt.

  ‘Right, let’s go,’ said Michael. They sat either side of her, each of them holding one of her arms around the back of his neck, and then they lifted her up into a standing position. Her head hung down between them, and as they walked toward the door her feet trailed on the carpet.

  Please God, let me be doing the right thing, Michael thought. Maybe we should just tuck her up in bed again, and get the hell out of here. What if I really do kill her, trying to take her away like this?

  Lloyd opened the door and they dragged Natasha Kerwin out into the corridor. She wasn’t heavy but she was so lifeless that it was an effort to keep her up straight.

  ‘What’s the plan now, Greg?’ asked Lloyd. ‘How are we going to get her out of here without Henry blowing the whistle on us?’

  ‘We’ll take her to the front entrance, OK? Then I’ll borrow your jacket, put up the hood, and jog past Henry and give him a wave as I go, so he’ll think you’ve left.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Then I’ll jump into the Jeep, and come screaming in through the gates. We’ll lift Natasha into the back seat, and then we’ll go screaming back out again, before anybody can stop us. A few yards down the road, I’ll let you out. Then I’ll go hightailing off to Route Ninety-Seven.’

  Lloyd nodded. ‘Sounds good. Well, semi-good, so long as Henry gets taken in.’

  They reached the lobby. Two red lights were flashing on the receptionist’s switchboard, but there was still nobody around. Lloyd held the door open with his back while they maneuvered Natasha Kerwin out on to the front steps. Outside, the cold was instant and razor-sharp, but it was hard to think that she could feel any colder than she did already. Michael supported her in his arms while Lloyd wrestled himself out of his snow jacket.

  Her head was tilted back now, and her lips were slightly parted. Although her eyes were closed he had the feeling that she was aware he was holding her, and that she felt that she was safe. He was more sure than ever that he knew her. He even had the feeling that he loved her.