This is crazy.
I don’t care.
It was freeing, this not caring. She was unmoored from everything: family, friends, home, her real life. Even time had stopped having meaning since she started at the Sun Down, the days and nights jumbled into a long stretch that was as understandable as ancient Sanskrit. She looked at people anchored by time—get up in the morning, go to sleep at night, come home from work at six o’clock—as people she politely shared the world with but didn’t understand. Why did people bother? The nights were so long now; it was night in the morning and it was night now. It was all darkness broken briefly by muddled gray light. Even now it could be three o’clock in the morning as she sat in the traveling salesman’s garden. Who was to say it wasn’t?
A light came on in a window a few feet away. Viv sidled toward it, listening. She didn’t hear children’s voices. Somehow it would make things worse to know that children lived with the traveling salesman, like seeing a toddler walk onto an empty road. Move, move, run! If the salesman was who she thought he was, he should live alone with his wife—Viv pictured a pale, wilted woman, long given up on life—and no one else. It fit.
Viv squat-walked toward the lit window, then carefully raised herself to peek into the corner. It was the kitchen, and a woman was standing at the sink, her back to Viv, the water running as she rinsed dishes. She wore pants that were elastic at the waist and a roomy T-shirt. With the practiced eye of a girl in theater, Viv noted that the woman’s clothes were handmade on a sewing machine.
A man walked into the kitchen. He was of average height, average build, trim and clean-shaven with short hair brushed back from his forehead. He wore dress pants and a dress shirt with rolled-up sleeves and no tie. His face was square, his eyes small and nondescript. The last time she’d seen him, he’d smiled at her with a smile that didn’t fit his face and made her queasy. I guess I’m just that memorable, he’d said. Without a word he put a plate on the counter next to the woman and left the room again.
Hello, Simon Hess, Viv thought.
The woman, she knew, would tell her husband about the strange phone call she got today. The scheduling service that had thought he was in New York. And the traveling salesman would look puzzled and say to his wife, Of course they knew where I was. Why would they call? Perhaps they’d already had this little exchange; a simple phone call to his company would tip him off that someone he didn’t know had called about him. Viv had to move fast.
She ducked from the window again and squat-walked to the back yard, opening the latch to the backyard gate and peering in. It was a suburban fenced back yard, with a patio and a lawn in the dark. Still no sign of children’s toys. Viv closed the gate again and backed out.
She had no idea what she was looking for—just something. Something that would put her closer to him, reveal something about him. She walked low against the house to the front again and saw the salesman’s car in the driveway.
She crouched and moved to it. Peeked in the windows. The car was clean, as if he had bought it yesterday. No rips in the upholstery. No wrappers or junk. Nothing that said a man had just traveled in this car to Buffalo and back, that a man traveled in this car all the time.
She circled the car. If someone came by right now, she would be in plain view. The neighbor across the street could likely see her if he was looking out his window. The house across the street was dark with no car in the driveway. Still, she had to be fast.
The passenger seat had a few pieces of paper on it. Viv tried the passenger door and when it opened, unlocked, her blood went hot and pounding in her veins. She reached in and picked up the papers.
It was a schedule, typed up and run through a ditto machine. The ink smelled like school, and for a second Viv was dizzy with memories of class. Then she focused on what she was reading. It was a schedule, the words typed neatly.
Monday: Mr. Alan Leckie, 52 Farnham Rd., Poughkeepsie.
Wednesday: Terra Systems, Bank Street, Rochester.
Thursday: Monthly meeting at head office.
Viv almost laughed. This was from the salesman’s actual scheduling department, the one she’d pretended to be a few hours ago. She flipped back and saw the schedule for the previous week, and the week before that. How long did they keep records? She wondered.
The schedule pages had letterhead, a contact name, a phone number. Viv slid the bottom page from the pile—maybe he wouldn’t notice the bottom page gone?—and folded it into her pocket. She was just pushing the door shut when she looked up and saw the face in the living room window.
It was a girl, about ten, with long, straight hair tucked behind her ears. She was watching Viv with no expression.
Viv started. There had been no sign of kids anywhere. She should run, but instead she followed an impulse and met the girl’s eyes through the window. She put a finger to her lips. Be quiet, okay?
The girl gave no indication of agreeing or not. Instead she lifted a hand and pointed silently in the direction of the front door. He’s coming.
Adrenaline spiked straight through Viv’s body, up the back of her neck and down into her gut. She ducked down the driveway and jogged to her car, trying to look casual in case anyone was looking—I belong here! I’m just trotting
