Tread Softly

'It was pitch black.'

Scott leaned back in his lounge chair. He wiped the wet bottom of his cocktail glass on his trunks, but it dripped anyway as he took a sip. On the sun-heated skin of his chest, the splash of icy water felt like a knife prick. He rubbed it with his fingertips. 'Sounds like you had a rough time of it, pal.'

The words of sympathy seemed to hit Benny hard. His chin started to shake. He pressed his lips into a tight line.

'You sure all this really happened?' Julie asked. 'You weren't just dreaming or something?'

'It wasn't a dream,' he mumbled.

Tanya, sitting cross-legged with her back to the pool, said, 'The library worker went down to look around after Benny took off. She told me the lights were off and there were books on the floor. She thought Benny did it. According to her, nobody else was down there.'

'I wonder how well she looked,' Karen said.

'Did she happen to find a finger?' Julie asked.

'A finger doesn't normally just break off,' Scott said. 'Even if the bone. there are muscles, tendons, flesh.'

'And blood,' Julie added. 'There'd be blood all over the place.'

Shaking his head, Benny turned his hands over as if looking for stains. He said nothing.

Scott sipped his Bloody Mary. 'Well,' he said, 'whatever happened, it was pretty bizarre. I don't know what to think. But at least you're okay, Benny. That's what really counts.'

'What if it happens again?' he asked in a hushed voice.

'I don't imagine. well…'

'You should be all right,' Karen said, 'as long as you're with someone. Just don't go anywhere alone for a while, if you can help it. That way, if something funny happens again, you won't have to face it by yourself.'

'Maybe he needs a bodyguard,' Julie suggested.

Benny stared at her, blinking rapidly. 'You won't think it's so funny when it happens to you.'

'Spare me.'

'It was the curse,' he blurted, 'and you're part of the curse, too. All of us are, except Tanya. She's gonna try to get us all.'

'Who, Tanya?' Julie asked, smirking.

'The witch! She's got our stuff and I said we've gotta get it back and nobody listened. I'm just a crazy little kid and there's no such thing as witches and curses. Only there is, and she put a curse on us and it's gonna get us all if we don't do something!' He shoved himself off the chair and raced into the house.

Julie blew softly through her pursed lips. 'He oughta see a shrink.'

'That'll be enough out of you,' Scott snapped. 'The kid's been through God-knows-what and what he doesn't need is lip from you.'

Julie flinched, her smirk falling away. 'Excuse me,' she muttered, and walked toward the house.

Tanya, looking embarrassed, stood up and brushed off the seat of her shorts. 'I'll see how Benny's doing.'

'Thanks.' When she was gone, Scott turned to Karen. 'I shouldn't have lost my temper like that.'

'Happens to the best of us. God knows, it was mild compared to some of my tirades at school. I've been known to go totally berserk.'

Feeling better, Scott turned his chair to face her. She was leaning back, bare legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles, one hand curled around the glass resting on her belly. The front of the oversized, faded blue shirt she wore over her swimsuit had a patch of darkness from the glass's moisture.

'You deal with teenaged kids all the time,' he said. 'What do you make of my two?'

'I'd say, for starters, that Julie's scared, probably very upset about what happened to Benny.'

'Has a funny way of showing it.'

'The sarcasm's just a defense mechanism. She seems to use it all the time when she has trouble facing things. I don't think she's callous or insensitive. If anything, maybe she cares too much. The sarcasm's like a safety valve for her.'

'All right. I'll give you an A for that one. She's always been that way, hiding behind it. Just gets hard to take sometimes.'

'Look on the bright side — at least she doesn't go hysterical.'

'I guess that's a blessing, of sorts. Okay. What about Benny?'

'I'd say he's extremely imaginative and sensitive, and handling the situation remarkably well. I'd be a total basket case if I'd gone through what he did. So would most people. They'd freak out totally.'

'Do you think it really happened?'

'Yes.'

'All of it?'

'Yes.'

'How do you explain — '

She shook her head. 'I can't explain any of it. That's why I would've freaked out if it'd happened to me. I think Benny's fortunate, in a way, that he can blame the curse. It gives him a frame of reference that lets him deal with it. In terms of curses and magic, anything can happen, nothing is illogical.'

'You don't believe in that stuff?'

'The important thing is that Benny does. It's part of his reality. So this business in the library makes sense to him. Otherwise, God knows how he might've reacted.'

'Look, we don't believe in that nonsense. I don't, anyway. How am I supposed to figure out what happened?'

Karen grinned mischievously. 'Just keep telling yourself there's got to be a logical explanation. Write it fifty times on the blackboard.'

'What do you think?'

'There's got to be a logical explanation.'

'Like what?'

'Damned if I know.'

Scott laughed. 'You're a lot of help.'

She drained the last of her Bloody Mary.

'Refill?' Scott asked.

'Sure. Why not? While you're gone, maybe I can dream up a theory.'

'Try,' he said. 'Try very hard. I would appreciate a good, solid, down-to-earth explanation.'

'Right. I'll work on it.'

He took Karen's glass. Bending over her, he kissed her gently on the lips. Then he went into the house. Instead of turning toward the kitchen, he walked down the hall to Julie's room. Her door was open. She was lying on her bed under a Bruce Springsteen poster, staring at the ceiling, wearing her earphones. When she saw him enter, she pulled off the headset. 'Hey,' Scott said, 'I'm sorry I yelled at you.'

She answered with a shrug.

'I guess we're all kind of edgy.'

'It's okay,' she muttered.

'Why don't you give Nick a call, see if he'd like to come over early and have dinner with us? Say around five? I'll be doing steaks on the barbecue.'

'Okay,' she said, smiling slightly. 'That'd be nice. I'll check with him.'

'Fine.'

In the kitchen, Scott took an extra steak from the freezer. Then he prepared the Bloody Marys. He carried them outside. After the air conditioning of the house, the hot sun felt good. Karen was standing, taking off her shirt as he walked up behind her. She wore the same skimpy black swimsuit she'd taken camping. Except for crisscrossing straps, her back was bare to the waist.

'Ready for a dip?' Scott asked.

She grinned over her shoulder at him. 'Ready for a sip,' she said. She draped her shirt over the back of the