Animosity (12 page)

“That’ll be, um, $6.99, Mr. Holland,” said Round Man. “Please.”

I handed him a twenty-dollar bill. “So what happened to all my books, Round Man? Some dealer buy you out?”

He licked his lips. Scratched at an itchy spot behind his left ear. Watched a squat brown Toyota pull up at the gas pumps outside, and flinched at the resulting
ding-ding
as if he had never heard it before.

In a voice so low I could barely hear him, he said to me, “It’s nothin’ personal, Mr. Holland. Swear to God.”

“I don’t understand.”

Round Man’s face looked like that of a man in great agony as he set my change down on the counter. He scooted it toward me, along with my box of maxi-pads and my receipt. As if he were afraid to touch me, lest he contract some deadly disease.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

I stepped back from the counter. Felt cold all over.

“You gotta be kidding me,” I said. “Not you too.”

He fondled his monstrous goatee as if he wished he could crawl up inside of it and hide.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled again.

I shoved my change into my pocket. “This is unbelievable.”

He did not attempt to explain until I turned to leave.

“I got a business to run, Mr. Holland,” he said when I was halfway to the door. “People know me. People
like
me. I got loyal customers, folks who come to the Stop-N-Shop to get what they need even though that new 7-Eleven down the block might be a few bucks cheaper. I can’t let nothin’ jeopardize that, man. I got a family to feed, two mortgages on my house.”

I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there in front of the exit, my back to him. I could feel my blood pressure rising.

“It’s nothin’ personal,” he assured me again. “It’s just—”

“It’s just
what
, Round Man?” I said.

“The things they’re saying on the news. About you. People are talking, Mr. Holland. I don’t believe a word of it, of course, but—”

He glanced down at his sandals, then back up at me.

“They turn on you,” Round Man whispered, “if you go against the flow.”

“They turn on you,” I said, slowly nodding.

“Yeah.”

“Fucking tell me about it.”

I glared at Round Man. The silence between us seemed to swirl about the store like something tangible. Something living, dark, and hungry leeching away at the friendship we once shared.

He stared at the Slush Puppy machine along the Stop-N-Shop’s east wall. Toward the potato chip aisle behind me, and the beer coolers in the back. Anywhere but in my furious gaze.

He shifted his weight yet again from one foot to the other, and pointed toward something off to my left.

“You, uh… you wanna buy a ribbon, Mr. Holland?” he asked me.

For the first time, I noticed the cardboard display at the far end of the counter. IN MEMORY OF REBECCA LANNING, read the cursive Magic Marker logo at the top of this rack, above a collection of pink ribbons designed to be worn on collars and lapels, $1.99 OR 3 FOR $5.00.

“I was just thinking it might help matters,” Round Man babbled. “I mean… ya know… if you were, um, seen wearin’ one around town.”

“Jesus,” I hissed under my breath.

“Of course, it’s free for you,” he quickly added. “I wouldn’t think of charging my favorite writer, no way!”

A hoarse laugh slipped out of me against my will.

“Take one,” Round Man said. “Please? On the house. Here. Maybe your daughter would like one too?”

I could look at him no more. I had to get the hell out of there
now.

Trembling with rage, I forced open the Stop-N-Shop’s front door with the palm of one hand. Hard.

“God
damn
you,” I fumed, as I stormed back to my Explorer.

At the gas pumps, an ancient black man in a LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT JESUS T-shirt paused in filling up his Toyota.

I ignored his disapproving glare.

“God damn every one of you two-faced motherfuckers.”

From Thursday’s edition of the
Harris City Tribune,
Page 1:

SEARCH FOR CHILD’S KILLER CONTINUES

ONE WEEK LATER, POLICE HAVE NO LEADS IN SHOCKING SEX CRIME

Harris City Police report no new findings in their search for the murderer of nine-year-old Rebecca Faye Lanning, whose body was found on Poinsettia Lane one week ago.

Rebecca Lanning’s nude body was discovered by local writer Andrew Holland last Thursday morning. Holland, a resident of Harrison County, is the popular horror novelist who penned such provocative titles as Blood Dance, Brain Fever, Cannibal High, and Mortuary Smile.

“
The citizens of our fair city can rest assured that we are working around the clock to apprehend Rebecca Lanning’s murderer as soon as possible,” said Detective Paul Hembry, who is in charge of the investigation. “Meanwhile, here is a case of one man simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time… no connection between Mr. Holland’s livelihood (and) this terrible crime is suspected, nor should one be implied.”

Andrew Holland’s most recent novel, Slow Burn—a gory thriller about a serial murderer who burns pregnant women alive because he believes they are possessed by demons—debuted last year at #7 on the New York Times Bestseller List.

According to police records in his hometown of Jackson, Tennessee, Holland was sentenced to one year’s probation in April of ——, after pleading guilty to statutory rape.

The writer was unavailable for comment.

The Harris City Police Department urges anyone with information pertaining to the Rebecca Lanning case to call 704-555-4911 immediately.

I have never made a habit of reading or watching the news regularly. I always found it all too depressing, and needless to say that opinion multiplied tenfold after a child was murdered in my neighborhood. But at least once a week I did log on to the
Tribune
’s website, skimming the day’s top stories if only to procrastinate for a few minutes before getting started on my latest project.

On the morning in question, I slammed a fist down on my desk, narrowly missing my keyboard.

“Hot
damn!
”

It was not an exclamation of anger. A grin stretched across my face as I re-read that article on my computer screen a second time. A third. For now I barely even noticed the reporter’s enthusiastic mention of my chosen genre, or my indiscretion of twenty years ago. I had learned to expect as much, hated the media for what they were trying to do, but the only thing I could focus on for the next few minutes was that paragraph quoting Detective Paul Hembry. I almost wanted to hug him. God bless the chubby son of a bitch!

No connection between Mr. Holland’s livelihood and this terrible crime is suspected, nor should one be implied…

“It’s about freakin’ time!” I declared to my empty house. And again: “Hot
damn!
”

Instantly, a ten-ton weight seemed to lift off of me. I felt an odd sense of victory. Like a man who has beaten unbelievable odds, and can barely refrain from rubbing it in his detractors’ smug faces one by one.

For a minute or two, before I logged off the Internet and began my work for the day, I considered buying hundreds of copies of that morning’s paper, pasting the front page all over Poinsettia Lane so my self-righteous, shithead neighbors could see the error of their ways. Perhaps I would start near town, at Round Man’s 7th Avenue Stop-N-Shop, and work my way backwards. My last stop would be the cul-de-sac at the end of the block, right on the windshield of Keith Whitmire’s patrol car.

It was certainly a tempting thought.

Instead, I used my newfound energy to jump headfirst into my novel, reinvigorated and filled with an inner peace the likes of which I had not felt since long before Norman and I wandered onto the Clinton property at the end of the block.

The next few days passed uneventfully.

I stayed inside, venturing out of my house only to feed Norman, check the mail, and to pick up Sam for our weekend together. Once I thought about mowing the lawn, but decided against it when I spotted Floyd Beecham puttering about with a weed-eater in his own yard across the street. While the article in Thursday’s
Tribune
confirmed I had nothing to worry about in regards to being blamed for Rebecca Lanning’s death—and I was sure my neighbors must have conceded to the truth as well by now, after reading that quote directly from Detective Hembry—I hoped if I just laid low for a day or two, everything would blow over once and for all. Once my time with Sam was over, I immersed myself in my work as best I could, and before long I began to float on that creative high which often results from periods of increased productivity. Despite everything that had recently transpired, the constrained
edginess
that tingled within my bones like some supernatural presentiment of horrors yet to come soon dissipated into nothing more than an anxious desire to convince myself that things couldn’t possibly be as bad as they seemed. I had gotten it all wrong, misunderstood their intentions. I felt shunned by my neighbors, yes… but surely they meant me no harm. They were victims too, victims of their own paranoia in the wake of an unthinkable crime which had affected us all. The people of Poinsettia Lane only wanted to protect their children. I could not fault them for that. We were all afraid. Trust was a scarce commodity these days, and until the police caught the pervert who had raped and murdered Rebecca Lanning, any one of us could be her killer.

Our lives would return to normal. Friendships would be mended, apologies made. Once that little girl’s murderer was rotting behind bars where he belonged, we would persevere. Together. We would rebuild everything we had lost.

Eventually, this storm would pass…

Or so I thought. I
pretended
to believe as much.

Until the following Monday morning, when I awoke to find something in my driveway which made me realize my nightmare was just beginning.

***

I rose from bed several hours later than usual, after toiling on
A Feast of Souls
till well past three a.m. the night before. First things first, I started a pot of Starbucks Breakfast Blend in the kitchen. I turned on the radio atop the refrigerator. As the coffeemaker gurgled and hissed and two obnoxious WKRZ morning show deejays tried too hard to be hilarious in a skit about Richard Simmons being abducted by aliens, I tore open a box of strawberry Pop-Tarts and slid one into the toaster.

While the coffee brewed, I padded to the front door in my pajamas and a pair of old flip-flops.

Dust motes danced in the bright shaft of sunlight bleeding through my living room window. From somewhere down the street came the loud
beep-beep-beep
of a reversing garbage truck. A melodious duet between two flirting sparrows. A few seconds later, the shrill whine of an electric saw drowned out everything else—Freddy Morgan and Lorne Childress beginning their day’s work on Morgan’s new deck.

The smell of percolating java filled my house. I yawned, stretched. My bones creaked and popped, reminding me that I wasn’t getting any younger.

I opened the door, stepped out onto my porch into the path of a morning breeze.

And instantly my pulse quickened.

At the end of my driveway, half on the street and half on the curb bordering my property, my garbage can lay on its side like the fat green carcass of some plastic beast that had sprawled there to die overnight. Its lid sat a few feet away, wrenched from its hinges.

The can’s contents had been strewn
everywhere.

I frowned. Swallowed nervously. Winced at the taste of my own sour morning breath. A low droning noise, like the ominous rumble of approaching nuclear warheads, filled my brain as I tried to comprehend exactly what had happened here…

A pesky stray dog had gotten into my trash. Perhaps a reckless driver had swerved off the road in the middle of the night, committing a troublesome but otherwise harmless act of hit-and-run upon my garbage can. That was all.

I wanted to believe as much, tried like hell to force myself into accepting one of those scenarios, but after another minute or two of standing there staring at the pandemonium in my front yard, I knew I was wrong.

There was something too
meticulous
about this mess. A methodical sort of
pattern,
almost, to the rainbow of refuse cluttering the far corner of my property. None of my eviscerated garbage can’s guts littered the street. Or the Sommersvilles’ yard adjacent to mine. The Hefty bags in which I discarded my daily trash had not been ripped open haphazardly; rather, their yellow tie-strings had been carefully unknotted, as if by human hands.