Pooh was easy to kill. I found him asleep in his truck, parked in a hump of snow outside Jude’s motel room. It was five in the morning and the sky was turning a dreamy pink. Pooh lay across the front seat like a dead cow. The windows bright with long cracked fingers of ice. I climbed into the truck and checked his pulse; it was steady as a clock. I unfastened his belt and pulled his filthy jeans down around his ankles. He woke up then, snarling and grunting at me. I pulled him into the parking lot and he tried to fight but his own tangled jeans pulled him down. I kicked him in the head, the belly, until my legs were sore and my feet heavy as stones. He was unconscious. I stripped the rest of his clothes off and buried my knife in his thigh.
There is some difficulty walking. My legs are strangely distant, removed from my nervous system. The floor appears to move but doesn’t. I fall to my knees and laugh at myself. Perhaps I’m thinking about it too much. I stare straight ahead and walk. I pass a smoke lounge and duck inside and the air is literally blue. I try to make out faces but there are only eyes and disembodied mouths, fingers and wristwatches and burning stubs. I smoke two cigarettes and slip away gasping.
I killed Lucy, of course. And that made everything else possible. I killed her in the boat. I waited until she was drunk and her words fell apart in her mouth. The sun was behind a cloud when I shot her, and the first bullet took her face apart. She was still alive, breathing through shredded nostrils. One eyes was dark with blood and extraordinarily calm. I put the gun just above her ear and shot her again. I was half naked and a little drunk myself. The water pulled me over the edge of the boat and I let myself sink. The gun so heavy but I couldn’t let it go. I swam back to the boat and climbed in, nearly tipping it over. She already stank, and the flies were terrible. I put the gun in her hand and swam ashore; I had a knife and nothing else. I don’t know when her body was found. For ten days I was incoherent. I drank rainwater that pooled among rocks. I ate dandelions and chewed on the bark of a young ash. I chased my shadow like a dog. I made another cut in my arm at each sunset; I was slowly bleeding myself to death. When the state troopers found me, my tongue was swollen to the size of my fist. I couldn’t speak for days.
Children stare at me. Their mothers and fathers are discreet and look away, smiling. I bite my lip until it bleeds and I’m surely awake this time. I seem to walk for miles and then I pass through a doorway into the dining car. White tablecloths and cheap silverware and plastic flowers in blue vases. The smell of chicken and rosemary. A woman drinks iced tea with a bright twist of lemon and I have an urge to take it from her hands and pour it over my face. A man in a white jacket moves to intercept me. He holds a menu in one hand and his fingers are long and so white I think he’s wearing gloves, but his fingernails are sharp and yellow as bone.
Pardon me, sir. This dining car is for first-class passengers only.
Yes, I say. Of course. What does that mean?
He sighs. Are you traveling by coach or in a private compartment?
In a compartment. A box.
I see. And the number?
I’m not hungry. I just want some of that iced tea.
He smiles and shows me a mouthful of teeth. I’m glad he finds this amusing and I’m about to say so when Jude steps forward, a white napkin in her left hand.
Hello, I say.
This is my husband, she says. He’s easily confused, that’s all.
The man mutters his apologies and offers me a menu. I smile with lips that feel drained of blood.
I want some of that iced tea.
Of course, sir. He bites each word.
Jude takes my hand. Come on, dear. I have already ordered for you.
She leads me like a donkey. I follow and practice my smile. It doesn’t feel right and I want to ask her what she thinks. What’s wrong with you? she says.
Nothing’s wrong. A bit high.
You must be joking. If there had been a security guard on this car I think he would have shot you.
Why? I’m wearing a clean shirt. I have a nice smile.
You were leaning over that woman like you might rip out her throat.
The woman with the tea. I look back over my shoulder and she is pale as a ghost. Her husband is consoling her and the waiter is bringing a tray of complimentary pies.
Jude stops at our booth and I turn to see that we are not dining alone.
Now be nice, she whispers.
eighteen.
Sometimes there is nothing so horrible as a familiar face. The woman at Jude’s table, however, is a mutant. She’s two or three women at once. I see the woman from the train station. The same black high heels and white lace garter belt. A short wool dress the color of a cloudy day. Her hair is short as a young boy’s and black. She touches a napkin to her mouth and it comes away marked with red lipstick. She looks like an elf, a woodland fairy. I see the sweet young medical student from the emergency room. Rose White. She had bright red hair and pale white skin, I’m sure. I try to summon her face but I see only ashes. The hair and clothes are exactly like my dead wife’s. But she isn’t Lucy. She smiles across the table.
Phineas, says Jude. This is Isabel, someone I used to know. I haven’t seen her in years and then today I run into her on a train. Isn’t it a small world?
I sit down across from Isabel and take a sip of water. Jude’s medical bag dangles from a hook on the wall; the green icebox is nowhere to be seen. Jude is busily composing her face. I look under the table and between her legs. I look over my shoulder and under the butter dish.
Jude. Where is the icebox?
She bites my ear and whispers for me to shut up.
Isabel is preening herself. She touches up her lipstick, her bloody mouth. She frowns at her nose and snaps shut a compact mirror. I stare at her hair and wonder if it’s a wig. If I try to pull it off and it’s real there might be a lot of excitement and confusion. The waiter brings my iced tea on a silver dish.
Isabel grins at me. It’s very nice to meet you, Phineas.
I lift my glass and I can feel Jude watching me. Her fingers dance along my thigh.
It’s a pleasure, I say.
Isabel takes a roll from the bread basket and daintily smears it with butter. She tears off a small piece and it disappears between her teeth. She chews silently and swallows.
Oh, she says. I almost forgot. Congratulations.
I chew a piece of ice. For what?
Jude tells me you just got married.
That’s right. We just ran off like a couple of kids.
It must be nice, she says. To be in love.
Love is a reptile, I say. Don’t you think? If you cut off its tail it grows another one.
I stare at Isabel without blinking. I stare until I can see the pale roots of her natural hair and the expensive skin cream that changed her skin from milk to olive and the colored lenses that gave her yellow eyes and I wonder how she changed her breasts and ass and shortened her legs. I stare at her until her eyes are pointed and her teeth glitter like fangs and I have to close my eyes. If she said her name was Lucy and she faked her death I would believe her.
Jude pokes me and asks if I want chicken or beef.
Isabel shifts in her seat.
Chicken, I say.
Why are you staring at me? says Isabel.
Because you have an unusual face. Did anyone ever say that you look exactly like someone else?
She frowns. Of course.
Phineas, says Jude.
But you look like two or three people at once. Isn’t that funny?
Phineas, says Jude.
What?
Let go of the glass, she says. Let go.
I look down and the iced tea glass in my hand is cracked. A brown stain is forming on the tablecloth as tea and melted ice drip from my wrist. I let go and the glass falls apart. Two busboys appear and whisk away the tablecloth and everything on it.
Are you bleeding? Jude says. Her voice sounds funny, as if it’s about to come apart like the glass. I look at h
er closely and I see how red her eyes are, how colorless her lips. She looks like she wants to throw up. I lift my dripping hand so she can see there’s no blood.
I’m sorry.
I notice you aren’t wearing a wedding ring, says Isabel.
Jude shrugs. She opens her mouth and someone starts to laugh.
Well, brother. I thought I might find you here.
Henry is standing over us and the sun is coming through the window behind him. His face is completely obscured by shadow. His laugh is thick and lecherous. He sits down next to Isabel and offers her his hand. I’m Henry, he says. Phineas and I are associates. Which one of you is his beautiful wife?
With the slightest shudder of her thin shoulders, Jude asks Isabel and Henry to join us in our compartment for a drink. Henry grins so wide I can see the metal in his teeth. As we leave the dining car, Isabel asks us to excuse her; there’s a phone call she must make. Jude narrows her eyes and says that will be fine.
My stomach hurts and I realize that I’m starving. I never touched my chicken.
The drugs have faded and I am aware of my body again. Henry bows and offers to escort Isabel to her compartment. The train enters a tunnel and I automatically close my eyes. Everything is pink and I see shadow images. I open my eyes and see Henry leaning to whisper at Jude’s ear. His hand on her shoulder as if he’s pressing her down. She nods and says something, her lips barely moving. Henry winks at me and hurries to catch up with Isabel.
I grab Jude by the wrist and I feel the electricity in her. She’s full of juice.
What did he say?
She pushes me into a vacant bathroom the size of a coffin. I pull her close to me and it’s the first time I’ve held her without thinking of sex or violence.
His name isn’t Henry, she says.
I know. It’s his new identity.
How do you know him?
From the station. He gave me the lucky hat.
Jude rolls her eyes. Who the fuck is he?
He’s no one. He’s a drifter. An escaped convict.
No, she says. He’s more than that.
What about Isabel? Don’t tell me she was your college roommate.
She kisses me quickly. Let’s go. I want to be ready for them.
A cocktail party, I say. What were you thinking?
She shakes her head. It’s a game. Isabel wants to play and I’m going to let her.
I’ve met her before, you know.
Jude turns pale. What?
She was at the hospital. She was a medical student, a nurse. But she was different. She had red hair and pale skin and she was thinner, with kind of a flat chest. She gave me a ride. She gave me her phone number.
Jude doesn’t say anything. There is a trace of embarrassment in her eyes, as if I have just described an imaginary friend and she doesn’t have the heart to tell me that my friend isn’t real.
Her name was Rose White, I say.
Rose White. What a delicious name.
I close my eyes and try to remember. I was in shock and I was drugged and she was fucking real. I’m sure of it. But I hesitate to tell Jude that this person has transformed into the body of my dead wife.
Don’t worry about it, Jude says. It doesn’t matter what you saw or thought you saw. She’s here and we have to deal with her.
Why don’t you tell me who she is?
Isabel is my partner, she says. We do the organ routine together, like a dance. We choose a target, someone that’s on the edge. Someone that just stepped out of prison or rehab, someone still blinded by the sun and confused as a newborn. She seduces the target and I do the surgery. But we had a little fight about money, and I split. I decided to try a solo run, and I chose you. Is that what you want to hear?
You bitch, I whisper.
Jude smiles and touches my cheek. Oh, dear. Are you hearing voices again?
The fuck.
I will tell you the truth, she says. Soon.
I follow Jude back down the narrow passageway. It is completely unfamiliar and I shake my head. I did just come this way. Jude stops in the lounge and I think yes, a drink is a good idea. I wait behind her like a shadow, obedient and uninformed. She briskly tells the bartender that she wants to buy a bottle of mescal. He says, oh I’m sorry miss. No alcohol leaves the lounge. Jude hits him with a charge of animal heat; she gives him bottomless eyes and hard nipples, a voice like bone marrow and a palmed fifty. The old man rolls over panting. He provides a sack of limes and a shaker of salt. Jude thanks him, twirling a shot glass on her finger.
I crack the seal on the bottle before we reach our compartment. I ask her again where the icebox is. She tells me not to worry and takes the bottle from me.
Take it easy, she says. I don’t want you to get stupid.
I am stupid. I am the foolishness of flesh. Drinking gives me charm and texture.
She laughs and begins to straighten the tiny living area. She unfolds one bed.
The icebox, I say.
Jude points to a locked closet. It’s safe, okay?
I take another drink from the bottle and decide she might be right; I don’t need to get drunk. I am already blindfolded. I have no control, no focus. The icebox is all I can think of, but I can’t bear to open it, to look inside. The kidney is a chunk of repressed memory, buried deep and crushed by heavy earth. I’m unraveling and I’m soft inside. I need to be sharp. I need to be cruel. Jude is undressing. Her body is terribly distracting and I am tempted to take her from behind in a sudden, staggering rush. I loosen my belt.
She gives me her cool stare. I don’t think so, she says.
I watch her change into pale silver pajamas; the material is sheer and clings to her and the effect is maddening. I assume that’s what she intended. She reclines on the bed.
Why did you tell them we were married? I say.
Instinct, she says. Off the top of my head.
I like the sound of it.
Please. Don’t get misty on me.
This train stops in Vegas. We could be married in an hour.
She sighs and reaches for a magazine. The drugs are talking, she says.
I’m going to get some air, I say.
nineteen.
I stand in the passageway and try to meditate, to clear my head. I concentrate on the train beneath my feet. The constant motion, the plunge. The barely perceptible clicking of the tracks, rapid as a terrified pulse.
Henry and Isabel come toward me, their arms entwined. They have become fast friends, I see. Isabel has changed clothes. She wears a slinky black thing that might be called a dress. It might be a nightgown. She is certainly naked beneath it. I can feel blood swelling in my face and I open my mouth to tell Henry to get his hands off my wife. I laugh abruptly, grinning. I hold out my hand and Isabel looks at it with shiny contempt.
Henry laughs. Hello, brother. Why are you lurking here in the hall? You look as nervous as a thief. Or did the wife send you out for a gallon of milk?
Jude is inside, I say. I would like to speak with Isabel alone.
Certainly, he says. He kisses Isabel on the wrist and says, she is yours.
He disappears inside and I hear Jude tell him to sit down, to make himself at home. I take Isabel by the wrist, the same wrist kissed by Henry, and I imagine I can feel the warmth of his lips. I press her small bones between my thumb and fingers. She doesn’t resist. She barely seems to notice me. I pull her along to a section of coach. There are two empty seats and I tell her to sit down.
What is your name?
How feeble your memory is. My name is Isabel.
Are you sure? I can call you Rose if you like.
I don’t know what you mean. She carefully removes my hand from her arm and rubs the skin, but there is already a bluish mark in the shape of my thumb. I’m enjoying this. I can feel it in my teeth, like I have just bitten aluminum. This is silly, I say. I take long whistling breaths.
Yes, it is. And really unnecessary. If you are interested in me, just say so.
/> What?
You want to sleep with me.
Is that what you think?
It’s obvious. And charming, of course. But at the moment I’m rather more attracted to your friend.
Henry? He’s not really my friend.
Oh, really? That’s your loss, I’m sure.
I look at her full, pouting lips. She doesn’t talk quite like Rose; her voice is too bitter and jagged. And she doesn’t really look like Lucy. I stare at the line of her jaw, searching for evidence of makeup. An artificial tan, a bronze cream. There is nothing to see. Her small ears, her silky black hair. The heavy, round breasts. A slight tummy and hard, muscular legs.
You look nothing like the girl I remember.
And which girl do you remember, she says.
The one at the hospital. She gave me a ride to my hotel. Then on the telephone. I told her my life story and she gave me the wrong address. We had a date.
I’m sorry, she says. I’m sure I don’t know who you’re talking about. And you seem to be a very confused person. Delusional, I suppose. I have never seen you before today.
I do love your hair.
She smiles and cocks her head like a curious bird. I stroke a soft black wisp behind her ear, then tug it gently between my thumb and finger. It feels real.
I’m glad you like it, she says.
Oh, yes. You look exactly like Lucy, my dead wife.
Isabel presses her lips together and her face becomes pale and gaunt.
I hope so, she whispers. Jude designed me to look like her, to become her.
I could kill you.
She sighs. I didn’t really care for the idea, at first.
I could kill you a thousand times.
But I played along and I really think it’s a smash, don’t you?