[CHRONICLES]
[COMICS]
[COMMUNITY]
[COMMERCE]
[CONTACT]
[COMPOSITIONS]
[CONCERNING]
ReACQUAINTED by Jason Arnett
Andy lay in his bed covered to his midsection by the thin top sheet. He'd been deeply
asleep when the call had come through and he needed it badly.
"So," she said, "will you come?"
He hadn't talked to Lanette Fisher in nearly three months. When he realized it was
her on the other end of the line, he wasn't upset at all. Only surprised. He held
the receiver to his right ear and looked over at the empty left side of his bed,
his eyes still drooping, despite her question.
"Andy? You still there?"
He smiled. "Yeah. I'm here.
"Are you asking me for a date?"
"mm hm. D'you want to see me?"
He propped himself up on his left elbow and shoved himself so that he could sit with
his back against the wall of his darkened bedroom. The lamp on the table was going
to be too much light, but he needed to see what he was going to write down. "Very
much."
"Tell me where to be and when," he told her as he clicked on the lamp and reached
for the paper and pen he kept on the table.
"How about my apartment? It's easy to get to and Teri has been asking to see you,
too. I'll get my sister to watch her for me," Lanette said with a sense of anticipation
that he picked up on quickly.
"Really? I'd've thought she'd barely remember."
"You make quite the impression, Andy. Can you be here Saturday at eight?"
"Definitely," he smiled again, even more broadly. "I'm looking forward to it."
*************
Throughout the rest of the week, and all day on Saturday, he played that conversation
over and over in his head. He found himself smiling almost constantly, which made
his co-workers whisper when they thought he couldn't hear. He didn't mind the rumors
about himself (after all when you're the boss...), but the fact that Lanette used
to work with them all made him a bit angry, though he wasn't supposed to know about
the whispers.
As he pulled off the freeway to the exit that would take him to her apartment complex,
he began to concentrate on the evening ahead and hoped he could be as charming as
he wanted to be. He'd been interested in Lanette almost since the first day he met
her at the office. She was fierce and loyal and everything that he looked for in a woman,
but he was a little apprehensive, too. After all, in his mid forties, he was a good
eleven years her senior. He parked, took a deep breath and found the stairs up to
her floor.
Bing Bong!
He stood in front of her door rather nervously, wondering if he should have his hands
in his pockets or loose at his sides or folded in front of him. He'd taken them
out of his pockets for the third time when the door opened and a ten-year old blond
girl looked at him suspiciously. "Hello?" she said.
Then suddenly she launched herself at him and hugged his waist, happy as a lark.
"Andy!" she cried.
He laughed and hugged her back. "Hi, kiddo. How've you been?"
"I've missed you!"
The girl, Teri, turned quickly and grabbed Andy by his right hand to pull him into
the apartment. She then shouted across the place. "Mooom! He's heeere!" Andy
took in Lanette's decorating skills, and admired the little apartment. She'd always
had excellent taste in clothes, and she knew how to make use of the space she had here.
Then he saw her.
She came out of a back room (he assumed it was her bedroom), putting an earring in
her left ear. Her long black hair was loosely pulled into a bun on the back on her
head but for stray wisps that were strategically freed to help frame her face. The
black party dress and string of pearls accented her beauty. "Hi, Andy."
"Hi, Lanette."
Lauren, Lanette's sister, stood in the doorway behind and smiled at Andy, too. He'd
never met her before, but was surprised that Lanette had actually gotten her to babysit.
From all the things he'd been told... It must be a good week, he guessed. Lanette, however, chose not to introduce them. Instead, she bent down to kiss Teri on
the cheek. "Be good for Lauren, little girl."
"Be good your own self," Teri said with a wink and a smile as Lanette stroked her
hair.
Lanette wrapped an antique-looking shawl over her shoulders and picked up a small
handbag from the couch. "Call my cel if you need to, Lauren. Have fun."
Lauren watched them go and waved. "I will."
"Good night, Teri," Lanette said. "I'll see you in the morning."
Outside the apartment, Andy looked at her, and she looked right back at him in the
easy light of the sidewalk lamps of her complex.
"She's beautiful," he said to her.
"And a handful."
"Well then she takes after you in more ways than one."
"You know," Lanette said, reaching up for the back of his neck. "Before we go another
step..."
She kissed him for what seemed forever.
He put his arms around her, she pulled him closer, tighter. Her shawl nearly dropped
to the ground. He nearly picked her up. Slowly, they pulled back from each other,
with littler kisses belying their reluctance to part at all. Without a word, she
hooked her right arm through his left as he escorted her to his car.
"I've waited too long for that," she told him as she put on more lipstick, using the
passenger side mirror.
"What d'you mean?" Andy was wiping his mouth with a tissue from the glove compartment.
Lanette smiled playfully at him. "You don't remember?"
Andy put the key in the ignition and began to study the steering wheel. "I didn't
know if you'd noticed. You never said anything before and you stopped calling, so..."
"I was waiting for you to kiss me that last day at work, Andy."
"I wanted to, Lan. But I couldn't, and you know it. There were so many reasons not
to. And I nearly did any way, out of impulse."
Andy pulled his car out into traffic and looked at her out of the corner of his eye.
She was looking at him, still remembering fondly. "I wanted you to kiss me. Damn
the office gossip, any way. If you had, I'd have melted right there."
"Another good reason," he laughed. "But I never stopped thinking about it. I kicked
myself pretty hard for not kissing you that day."
"Really?"
He guided the car through traffic with little effort. There was less traffic than
he was used to, so he stole a glance at her again. "Oh, yeah. It's difficult not
to think about you."
*************
"Can I get you anything else?" the waitress asked.
"Coffee for me. Lan?"
"Yes, coffee and cream, please," she said as the waitress took away their empty plates.
"I'll be right back," she said pleasantly.
The restaurant was elegant and expensive, but nearly all the patrons were dressed
for a casual evening out. The men were easygoing without their ties and the women
all looked radiant with their jewelry sparkling in the soft light.
"So," Lanette said, dabbing at the corner of her mouth with the linen napkin. "How's
Jimmy?"
Andy smiled at the mention of his friend. "He's typically Jimmy. He's got a new
show that the networks want to pick up, but he's stalling them again.
"He invited me out to the island club, but I couldn't go."
"Why not?"
Andy looked slightly embarrassed to disclose his reason, but he felt comfortable enough
to say it out loud. "I had a dream that you were going to call. I didn't want to
miss it, if you did."
She reached across the table and put her hand on top of his. Their eyes locked on
each other and a connection was made. "I'm so very glad you didn't go."
"Me, too," he said.
*************
After finishing their coffee, the pair walked arm in arm in the light of the full
moon along the recently renovated River Walk. The trees on the far side of the river
swayed lazily in the night breezes that helped cool some of the humidity. Andy and
Lanette were virtually the only people along the Walk as it was too early for the homeless
to've arrived and too late for other couples to still be out in public. They found
a bench and sat very close to each other. He put his right arm around her and she
did her best to melt her body into his. After a long while without any words at all,
she looked at the moon and then sighed.
"What makes you happy?" she asked him.
"Sitting here with my arm around Lanette Fisher," Andy said with a grin.
She slapped her hand at his chest and sat up a bit, but not enough that he'd take
his arm away. "I'm serious, Andy! What makes you happy?"
With a sarcastic look, Andy tilted his head back and acted like a know-it-all. "Oooooh.
You want 'The Definition'."
She sat forward and frowned slightly, still almost smiling, though. "Maybe I don't
if you're going to tease me."
He turned sideways on the bench to face her, his arm still along the back, and looked
penitent. "Sorry." He took another deep breath. "Okay, here it is:
"What really makes me happy is making my--- well--- my Other Half happy."
She looked doubtful at this answer, though it appeared that he'd thought it over on
more than one occasion.
"Truthfully. Although with a failed marriage on the books, I can't say I've been
all that successful at it. No regrets, though." He smiled and quoted Steely Dan.
"'No hearts breaking, no remorse'.
"How's that?"
She softened to him again, leaning forward to kiss him again. "You know what makes
me happy?"
"What?"
He saw them kiss, the anger welling up inside him, unarticulated. Just raging.
"Her," he thought. "Again. With him."
Andy and Lanette sat back and took a moment to collect their thoughts and regain something
akin to normal breathing. They only had eyes for each other at the moment, oblivious
to the world around them. "Wow," Andy managed to get out.
"That's what makes me happy," she said slyly. She reached into her purse and he moved
right next to her on the bench. Neither saw the hulking shape of a man approaching
from the other side of the parking lot. "And since my sister's watching Teri at
my place, her apartment's empty... And, well---"
She pulled a key out and dangled it, looking at him from the corner of her eye. "I
have a key. Interested?"
he smiled at her again, this time there was love behind it and she could see it.
She also noticed the man walking up behind them and saw a glint of steel in his
hand.
"Oh, yeah," Andy said.
Lanette said his name softly, unable to do more. She was suddenly very afraid. The
man had so much long, ratty hair that she couldn't see his face. He was huge. Tall
and wide. He wore what looked like a bear's skin as a vest, and she thought his
eyes glowed faintly red.
"Lanette? What's wrong?" Andy turned and saw the Mad Staggers behind him. His left
hand glinted in the moonlight with what looked like steel talons attached to his
fingers. Andy stood up and was dwarfed by the man's size. Staggers had been human
once, a long time ago. Now he was an amalgam of spells and curses and rage that kept him
going when he should have died six hundred years previous. The rage that he never
had caught the cook who had dared to bed his wife, who so looked like the woman on
the bench.
"no," he said in a gravelly voice that seemed to echo, somehow. "you are not her."
Andy screwed up his courage. "Then move on," he said with some small confidence,
"and leave us alone."
Staggers' eyes glowed brightly with the red rage that suddenly consumed him. He grabbed
Andy by the throat with his right hand and lifted him off the ground.
"ANDY!" Lanette cried. "HELP! SOMEBODY HELP!"
Andy screamed as the talons tore through his belly with a sickening rip.
"ANDY!"
Staggers dropped Andy with a dull thud. He looked up at the moon, suddenly, as if
listening to a voice in his head. He turned and continued in the direction he'd
been going when he saw the pair kissing on the bench. Lanette moved out of his
way and tried to comfort Andy. She knew he was dying and that there was nothing she could do.
"oh, god," she kept saying.
He was writhing on the ground, bleeding to death rapidly. He only had a few minutes
before he died, he thought. Lanette held his face so he could see her. "You're
gonna be okay, Andy," she lied to him. He knew it.
"No, I'm not," he gasped. "That monster's --- killed me."
She started to cry. The pain that had wracked him so, suddenly lessened, and she
could see it in his face as he relaxed, trying to look at her.
"but at least I got to ---
"---to.."
Gone, she thought. She cried into his neck, trying to cradle his body. Lanette was
covered in his blood and repeating his name over and over when the ambulance finally
arrived.
There was only one person she knew would somehow understand.
She'd have to call Jimmy in the morning. But tonight, she'd grieve for the love she
should have had.
To Be Continued.
© 2002 by Jason Arnett. All rights reserved.