By the Light of His Lantern Read online

  Ten minutes she waited, sweat dripping from her temples, and nothing happened at the bar.

  “Do you need help or something?”

  Catherine jumped in her seat. A man approached her window. He was young and scrawny, hair orange as an orangutan. When he saw her expression he slowed, kept a comfortable distance.

  “Is there something I can help you with?” he asked again.

  “No. I’m all right.” Catherine felt too on edge to smile. “I’m fine.”

  “Okay. I thought maybe you were stuck here or something.”

  It was then she noticed his colorful, logoed shirt with a name badge on the chest. Steve. He was the gas station clerk, though she didn’t remember him when she’d bought her bottled water.

  “No, I’m just waiting for someone. Thank you, though.”

  He gave a curt wave of the hand and turned back to the store entrance. Catherine took a sip of her water, then decided to drain it instead. She threw the empty bottle on the passenger floor. She pulled down the sun visor mirror and looked herself over, a compulsive habit. As she raised it back she spotted a purple car pulling out of the parking lot across the street.

  “Oh, shit.”

  Rosaline departed at a pace Catherine thought needlessly dangerous. She was heading somewhere in a hurry.

  Catherine—ice cubes playing plinko down her ribcage—dialed Beth, muttering under her breath as the phone rang and rang until it didn’t anymore.

  “What are you doing, Beth…”

  She started the car. She put it in reverse just as her phone started ringing and buzzing in her lap. She snatched it up, only to see it wasn’t Beth who called her. It was Lara. She answered.

  “Lara?”

  The words coming through were unintelligibly despaired. Lara was on the other end babbling something, her mouth too far from the phone to even begin making out what it was.

  “Lara, you have to calm down. What’s going on?”

  “Rob’s here!” she cried.

  Another cold punch to the gut. “What do you mean Rob’s there?”

  “Rob’s outside. He’s banging on the door…” Lara lowered the phone to screech something at him. Catherine heard ‘go away’.

  Catherine sat listening to the hysteria on the other end of the line, thinking.

  “Lara, I’m calling the police. I’ll be there in a few.”

  “Don’t call the police!” Lara said. “He’ll tell them everything. Don’t.”

  “What is he doing there?”

  “He’s here for money.”

  So many thoughts whirled through Catherine’s mind. Did he have the gun? Was this all a ploy? Was Lara still in cahoots with him and this was their roundabout way of getting the money out of her? They now essentially had her house again. Were they luring her home to rob her a final time? But if that were the case, she thought, none of these theatrics were necessary. Another ambush would suffice…

  There was a commotion on the other end. Lara screamed.

  “Lara, I’ll be there soon. Don’t open the door.”

  Catherine reversed the car, put it in drive, and swung out into the street much like Rosaline had only moments ago.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  There was another car parked outside when she arrived, beaten and dirty as Lara’s but without the charm of calling it a ‘little red car’. Rob was at the front door, leaning against it tiredly. He turned as Catherine pulled into the driveway. He stepped away from the door, waited at the top of the porch steps. She unfastened her seatbelt. She prepared to get out, lungs swelling with both her breath and fury in equal measure. She shook with it, and it felt nice for a change to tremble with something other than fear for once. She stepped out of the car, purse clenched in one hand, strap dangling. Rob came down the porch steps toward her. His face was greasy and sunburnt peeking out from his jacket, a choice in attire which Catherine would attribute to insanity if she didn’t know the reason he kept one hand in the jacket’s pocket. She stormed across the driveway toward him and watched as his feet faltered on his way to meet her.

  “You want money?” she asked. “Is that why you’re here again?”

  He nodded, but he wasn’t looking too smug.

  She opened her purse and dug around inside. It was broad daylight, the spring disguising itself as midsummer with shriveling heat, and Catherine felt too impatient to care what her neighbors might think, should they be watching. She fished out a wad of what looked to be nothing but dollar bills. She threw it at Rob’s feet.

  “There. That’s it. That’s all I have for you.”

  Rob stood, shoulders slack, face pouting. Catherine thought he looked like a little boy then, ill-equipped to pretend he had any plan beyond simply stomping his feet and making demands. He planned his schemes about as well as they did.

  “That’s not all you have,” he said.

  “That’s all you’re getting.” She stepped toward him, crushed the money under her feet as she closed the space. “You put that money in your pocket with that gun we both know you aren’t using any time soon. And if you want to make a bigger scene than this, go ahead. Call the police. They’ll come for me and they’ll leave with you. I have nothing on me.”

  “I’ll tell them about the man down in—”

  “Go ahead. He’s gone.”

  Rob didn’t say anything. Catherine stared him in the eyes.

  “He’s gone,” she said again. “Do you understand?”

  Rob looked over his shoulder. The curtains in the window were pulled apart, Lara watching from inside.

  “And you leave her alone. She doesn’t want anything to do with you anymore. And even if she did, I won’t have it.”

  “You can’t—”

  “No, I can’t. But I’ll try. You should get some help as well. Doesn’t matter to me. Just stay away from us. I’m clean now, as far as the police are concerned, so I won’t hesitate to call them if you make me. Do yourself a favor and get out of our lives.”

  He looked over his shoulder again. The curtains were no longer pulled apart but Lara was surely still watching. They had something between them, Catherine understood, however unhealthy it was. She knew how tempting something could be when you felt you had nothing. She only hoped Lara would find something else. Something better.

  “I don’t want to see you again,” Catherine said, and she moved past him. She unlocked the front door and went inside without giving him another glance. She set her purse on the coffee table, blew out the long breath she’d been holding in.

  “What happened?” Lara asked. She was seated on the couch under the window. “What did he say?”

  Catherine rubbed her temple where a painful throb had formed.

  “I can’t have this right now,” she said, almost a whisper. “This is the last thing I need right now…”

  “Are you okay?”

  “No, Lara. I’m not okay. There is nothing okay with me right now.”

  She mumbled, “Are you upset with me…”

  “He’s leaving, and you’re not to see him again. Do you understand?”

  Lara was quiet.

  “Do you understand?”

  “I understand.”

  Catherine rounded the coffee table, loomed over her daughter, that fury still leaking from every pore.

  “I need you to understand that, because I’ve got enough going on right now. I can’t handle this on top of everything else. Please don’t give me more reason to worry about you.”

  Lara met her mother’s eyes, which Catherine knew couldn’t have been easy. Her daughter looked at her with so much regret and shame, a look that said nothing will ever be the same between them, and Catherine’s fury was promptly extinguished in a downpour of heartache.

  “I won’t,” Lara said. It was a promise made in tone of voice alone.

  Catherine stood there a bit, catching up with her thoughts.

  “I hope he doesn’t come back… I need a drink of water…”

  Halfway to the ki
tchen her phone began to ring inside her purse on the coffee table. Those ice cubes fell again, heavier than before. She’d nearly forgotten.

  “Damn it,” she said.

  “What?”

  She dug out her phone. Besides the phone call, it appeared she had an unread text message. Both were Beth.

  “It’s Beth. Apparently she sent me a picture earlier but I haven’t had a chance…”

  She answered the call.

  “Is everything okay?” she said. “I meant to call you, but something came up here at home and I had—”

  “Mrs. Blake?”

  Lara shook her head, mouthing ‘what is it?’ as she watched her mother’s eyes go foggy and distant.

  The woman, whose voice did not belong to Beth, repeated herself.

  “Mrs. Blake?”

  “Um… yes. Yes?”

  “Hello, Mrs. Blake. This is Rosaline Avila. I think we have met.”

  Her mouth was dry. “Yes, I think so.”

  Rosaline’s voice carried over the phone in the most calming and pleasant manner, the malice underneath somehow amplified by it.

  “I have a friend of yours here at the bar. I do not think she is fit to drive home, and would feel much better if you could come pick her up. Could you do that?”

  A stream of expletives jammed in the back of her throat, words of terror and panic, she could hardly answer past them.

  “I—I’ll be there right away.”

  “Oh, good. See you soon.”

  Rosaline Avila hung up.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  “I wish I didn’t need to bring you,” Catherine said, as Lara buckled herself in while they pulled out of the driveway.

  “No, it’s okay,” Lara said. “I want to come. I want to help.”

  “I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t think it’d be a good idea to go alone… depending on what they’ve done to her…”

  The afternoon was hot and intensely bright. Not a cloud in the sky.

  “What do you think happened?” Lara asked.

  “She was caught. I don’t know what else.”

  A little more than ten minutes later they pulled into the bar parking lot. Beth’s car was parked there, the only car. After shutting off the engine they sat together, though it didn’t do them any good talking about what might happen when neither of them had any clue.

  “Am I coming in with you?”

  “No, stay out here. I’ll leave the keys in case it gets hot. And if anything happens out here, scream. Okay? Honk the horn. Anything. Just… if I take too long in there…”

  “You want me to call the police?”

  “No, not that.” Catherine thought. “For all I know they’ve done nothing. I don’t know. I knew Beth shouldn’t have…”

  She stepped out onto the hot asphalt. Walking toward the entrance, she felt like she was in middle school again, walking to the front of the classroom to give a presentation. Only the classroom was one woman, and her presentation was on how she most definitely did not scheme to rob that woman of something in her own home.

  She couldn’t see Lara through the glare on the windshield, but she gave a reassuring wave just before she went inside.

  The music was off, along with most of the lights. The door shut behind her. She waited near it, scanning the empty room. Tables were cleared, though chairs hadn’t been put up. It was apparent the bar had been evacuated by management. The word ‘hello’ sat in the back of her mouth but she couldn’t speak it. She continued waiting. She scanned the bar again and again, watching for anyone who might be hidden in those far dark corners. A dusty odor hung in the air. The door to the office behind the bar was closed.

  What if she’s dead?

  “Hello?” she finally said.

  Did they have cameras, she wondered? Were they watching her?

  She opened the entrance door just enough to poke her head out, where she peered across the parking lot to her car. The sun streaked across the windshield, where she assumed Lara was still sitting tight.

  She jerked her head back inside when she heard the door to the office swing open. Rosaline was there. She stepped out behind the bar, wearing an amicable smile.

  “Hello, Mrs. Blake.”

  “You can call me Catherine.”

  Rosaline ignored her. “I am glad you were able to swing by, I think your friend is ready to go home for the day.”

  “What’s happened to her?” Catherine walked to the bar, but her eyes darted around those same faraway corners.

  “She is fine,” Rosaline said. She bent across the bar and collected a couple glasses which must have been left by customers. She turned and set them in the sink against the wall. “I think she is a bit exhausted, is all.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Snooping through someone’s home will do that, you know.”

  She turned around from the sink, still pleasant as ever, though her eyes met Catherine’s a little sharper than before.

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  The smile faded, the eyes remained narrowed.

  “What gave you the idea you could come into my home without invitation?”

  “I don’t know what—”

  “What gave you the idea you could try and take things which belong to my family? Steal from me?”

  She waited for Catherine’s answer even when they both knew what it would be, which was apparent when she interrupted her a second time.

  “I really don’t—”

  “You have done a very bad thing, Mrs. Blake.”

  Catherine didn’t speak.

  “I will not accept your play at ignorance. You must answer for it.”

  To admit to their plan would be a mistake, she thought. She didn’t know what Beth might have said. She also didn’t know what might happen if she stuck to her denial, but it felt safer than taking responsibility for something that, in all fairness, she couldn’t be accused of without any doubt.

  “I don’t understand what you’re asking me to say.”

  “My husband, after discovering there was nothing wrong with your friend’s car, found your friend in our bathroom with one of my books. We looked through her phone and found a message sent to you. A picture.”

  Catherine’s drumming heart rendered her speechless, her throat wobbling like a smokestack in an earthquake.

  “You stole from me.”

  She hadn’t looked at the message on her phone yet. It was a picture. She guessed it was a photo of the page they needed, the antidote. There was no denying the accusation now. She couldn’t walk out, not without Beth. And the only way to get Beth was to give Rosaline what she wanted.

  “My phone is in the car.”

  “I want it.”

  “Okay, if you’ll give me a second to get it.”

  “I will come out with you.”

  Catherine looked to the open office door, where she thought maybe they were holding Beth. If that were the case, Rosaline wasn’t the only one back there with her.

  Catherine held the door for Rosaline as they left the bar. They crossed the parking lot, Rosaline following behind, her heels clacking cleanly on the pavement, shadow bobbing to Catherine’s right. The sun, lower now in its descent towards night, lit the windshield up bright as the sun itself, so that Catherine had to look away as they approached. She opened the driver’s side, bent in… and found the passenger seat empty. The keys remained. Her purse remained. But Lara was gone. In that instant her instinct was to panic. She had half a mind to ask Rosaline what the fuck they’d done with her daughter. But as she bent there, already sweating in the car’s heat, she realized Lara might have gone on her own. Was she scared? Was it all too much?

  Did she know something?

  Catherine kept her alarm to herself. She searched her purse until she found her phone. She handed it to Rosaline.

  “Did you send the picture to anyone else?”

  “No,” she answered. “I didn’t even get to open it or look at it myself.�
��

  Rosaline, her ageless face shielded by the sleek curtain of her hair, browsed Catherine’s phone right there next to the car. Tap, tap, tap.

  “You did not look at it, you say?” she asked, without taking her attention off the phone. “You would have unread messages, if that was the case.” She looked up, dark eyes sparkling with mischief. “A thief and a liar.”

  “I didn’t look at it, I swear.”

  “It does not matter,” she said. She stuck Catherine’s phone into her pocket. “I am keeping this, just to be safe. I hope you have not sent it anywhere else.”

  Catherine shook her head.

  “Let us go back to the bar.”

  They were halfway across the parking lot when Catherine stopped.

  “Is Beth even in there?”

  “She is inside. You can take her home now.”

  Catherine’s stomach writhed and ached with nervous cramps. She imagined Rosaline carrying a body bag out from the office for her to put in the trunk of her car. They reached the entrance and stepped inside.

  “I am sorry you have regrets,” Rosaline said, leaving Catherine at the end of the bar as she made her way to the office door. “That does not make it okay to steal from me. You understand this, yes?”

  “I understand,” she said, desperate to have Beth back and to get the hell out of her bar. “You won’t hear from me again.”

  Rosaline paused in the doorway. She smiled, then said, “That’s fine.”

  She disappeared into the office. A minute later—an agonizing minute—Rosaline emerged, alone at first. Then behind her Beth came, and behind Beth a large man whom Catherine recognized as Rosaline’s husband. Beth, even at first glance, was not okay.

  “What happened?” Catherine asked. “What did you do to her?”

  “I’m okay,” Beth said. She walked haggardly, like someone walking their final steps in the endless desert. It was almost like she was drunk. But her face… there was something on her face, a smear of red from her brow to her chin.

  “Are you bleeding?”

  Catherine moved toward them. Rosaline stood aside and let Beth through. Catherine took her by her hands, looked her over. She looked into Beth’s eyes, who looked back but wasn’t wholly there.