eyes still stare off toward the blank face of the TV from above the folds of the yellow african, but yes, his hand is squeezing hers. It is a kind of long-distance squeeze, and why not? He's plenty far away, even if his body is here, and where he is, he might be squeezing with all his might.
Lisey has a sudden brilliant intuition: Scott is holding a conduit open for her. God knows what it's costing him to do it, or how long he can keep it up, but that's what he's doing. Lisey lets go of his hand and gets up on her knees, ignoring the tingling burst of pins and needles in her legs, which have almost gone to sleep, likewise ignoring another great cold gust of wind that shakes the house. She tears away enough of the african so she can slide her arms between Scott's sides and his unresisting arms, so she can clasp her hands at the middle of his back and hug him. She puts her urgent face in the path of his blank stare.
'Pull me,' she whispers to him, and gives his limp body a shake. 'Pull me to where you are, Scott.'
There's nothing, and she raises her voice to a shout.
'Pull me, goddam you! Pull me to where you are so I can bring you home! Do it! IF YOU WANT TO COME HOME, TAKE ME TO WHERE YOU ARE!'
24
'And you did,' Lisey muttered. 'You did and I did. I'll be smucked if I know how this thing is supposed to work now that you're dead and gone instead of just gomered out in the guest room, but that's what it's all been about, hasn't it? All of this.'
And she did have an idea of how it was supposed to work. It was far back in her mind, just a shape behind that curtain of hers, but it was there.
Meantime, the Excedrin had kicked in. Not a lot, but maybe enough so she could get down to the floor of the barn without passing out and breaking her neck. If she could get there, she could get into the house where the really good dope was stashed…assuming it still worked. It better work, because she had things to do and places to go. Some of them far places, indeed.
'Journey of a thousand miles begin with single step, Liseysan,' she said, and got up from the booksnake.
Once more walking in slow, shuffling steps, Lisey set sail for the stairs. It took her almost three minutes to negotiate them, clinging to the banister every step of the way and pausing twice when she felt faint, but she made it without falling, sat for a little while on the sheeted mein gott bed to catch her breath, and then began the long expedition to the back door of her house.
XI. Lisey and The Pool
(Shhhh—Now You Must Be Still)
1
Lisey's greatest fear, that the late-morning heat would overcome her and she'd pass out halfway between the barn and the house, came to nothing. The sun obliged her by ducking behind a cloud, and a cap of cool breeze materialized to briefly soothe her overheated skin and flushed, swollen face. By the time she got to the back stoop, the deep laceration in her breast was pounding again, but the dark wings stayed away. There was a bad moment when she couldn't find her housekey, but eventually her fumbling fingers touched the fob—a little silver elf—beneath the wad of Kleenex she usually carried in her right front pocket, so that was all right. And the house was cool. Cool and silent and blessedly hers. Now if it would only remain hers while she tended herself. No calls, no visitors, no six-foot deputies lumbering up to the back door to check on her. Also, please God (pretty please) no return visit from the Black Prince of the Incunks.
She crossed the kitchen and got the white plastic basin out from under the sink. It hurt to bend, hurt a lot, and once more she felt the warmth of flowing blood on her skin and soaking the remains of her shredded top.
He got off on doing it—you know that, don't you?
Of course she did.
And he'll be back. No matter what you promise—no matter what you deliver—he'll be back. Do you know that, too?
Yes, she knew that, too.
Because to Jim Dooley, his deal with Woodbody and Scott's manuscripts are all just so much ding-dong for the freesias. There's a reason why he went for your boob instead of your earlobe or maybe a finger.
'Sure,' she told her empty kitchen—shady, then suddenly bright as the sun sailed out from behind a cloud. 'It's the Jim Dooley version of great sex. And next time it will be my pussy, if the cops don't stop him.'
You stop him, Lisey. You.
'Don't be silly, dollink,' she told the empty kitchen in her best Zsa Zsa Gabor voice. Once again using her right hand, she opened the cupboard over the toaster, took out a box of Lipton teabags, and put them into the white basin. She added the bloody square of the african from Good Ma's cedar box, although she had absolutely no idea why she was still carrying it. Then she began trudging toward the stairs.
What's silly about it? You stopped Blondie, didn't you? Maybe you didn't get the credit, but you were the one who did it.
'That was different.' She stood looking up the stairs with the white plastic basin under her right arm, held against her hip so the box of tea and the piece of knitting wouldn't fall out. The stairs looked approximately eight miles high. Lisey thought there really ought to be clouds swirling around the top.
If it was different, why are you going upstairs?
'Because that's where the Vicodin is!' she cried to the empty house. 'The damned old feel-better pills!'
The voice said one more thing and fell silent.
'SOWISA, babyluv is right,' Lisey agreed. 'You better believe it.' And she began the long, slow trek up the stairs.
2
Halfway up the wings came back, darker than ever, and for a moment Lisey was sure she was going to black out. She was telling herself to fall forward, onto the stairs, rather than backward into space, when her vision cleared again. She sat down with the basin drawn across her legs and stayed that way, head hung over, until she had counted to a hundred with a Mississippi between each number. Then she got up again and finished her climb. The second floor was cross-drafted and even cooler than the kitchen, but by the time Lisey got there she was sweating profusely again. The sweat ran into the laceration across her breast, and soon there was a maddening salt-sting on top of the deeper ache. And she was thirsty again. Thirsty all the way down her throat and into her stomach, it seemed. That, at least, could be remedied, and the sooner the better.
She glanced into the guest room as she made her slow way by. It had been redone since 1996—twice, actually —but she found it was all too easy to see the black rocking chair with the University of Maine seal on the back…and the blank eye of the television…and the windows filled with frost that changed color as the lights in the sky changed…
Let it go, little Lisey, it's in the past.
'It's all in the past but none of it's done!' she cried irritably. 'That's the smucking trouble!'
To that there was no answer, but here, at long last, was the master bedroom and its adjacent bathroom—what Scott, never known for his delicacy, had been wont to call Il Grande Poopatorium. She set down the basin, dumped out the toothglass (still two brushes, now both of them hers, alas), and filled the tumbler to the brim with cold water. This she drank off greedily, then she did take a moment to look at herself. At her face, anyway.
What she saw was not encouraging. Her eyes were
