THE HIDDEN — Chapter 25: REUNION — T.D. Barton & Derek Barton
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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: REUNION
Reflected light from the bath danced crazily across the ceiling, and Zelda watched it, abstractly, remembering the times she had spent with Nate. She thought back to when they first met: She was playing Fiona in a small-time production of “Brigadoon.” It was summer stock theater, in a North Chicago suburb called Palatine — very little, pay and even less prestige. On the last night of rehearsals, some of the cast members pooled their money to charter a bus into the downtown area for an impromptu sightseeing tour. She was conscripted to act as a guide, due to the fact that she was most familiar with the city. Although she was tired that night, due to endless rehearsals and hours spent memorizing lines, she agreed to go. She had become genuinely fond of most of the other actors, and, to be honest, a night in the city did sound like fun.
Several of the passengers on that little bus excursion had brought along their choice of alcoholic beverages, and at one point, someone decided they needed to stop and buy “munchies”. When the bus chugged into the lot of a small grocery store, everyone piled off at once and made a mad dash for the chips and snacks aisle. Zelda, remembering Fiona’s figure and the size of her costume, bypassed the snacks and opted to peruse the fruit and produce section. While selecting a ripe red apple, she found herself returning the smile of a young clerk who had been watching her since she entered the store.
His smile was quite charming, with the right blend of shyness and confidence, and she loved the way his bangs drooped down over one eye, forcing him to cock his head slightly and peer around them.
He walked boldly over to her and they began to talk. His manner was easy and sure, and he had a way about him that reflected a kind a gentle spirit. She was in love even before she knew his name. Sometimes love happens that fast, but it is rare. It is even rarer for love to last as a long and remain as strong as it had for the two of them. Their first dates had been simple. He came to almost every one of her performances. She would meet him after work or on her nights off for long walks in the park. Before long, they were spending every day together and, although neither of them spoke it aloud, they both knew they were in love.
One evening, they had planned a walk in the park, but when the rain came down in sheets, Zelda called him at work to say she couldn’t make it. He sounded disappointed, but understanding and they promised each other to meet the next evening. As the hours went by, she tried to concentrate on her studies, but the image of Nate, walking home alone in the rain, kept returning to her mind. She was restless and unfocused. Finally, at ten o’clock, she called his house to ask him to meet her, and damn the rain.
His father answered the phone and told her Nate had taken the elevated train to Palatine to be with her. “He moped around here like a wino on Sunday for a couple hours,” Nate’s father said. “Until finally, I tol’ him, I said, ‘Natey Boy, you ain’t gonna be happy till you see that girl. Why’nt you go visit her at her place?’ So that’s what he did.”
Zelda thanked her future father-in-law and grabbed her coat and raced, through the rain to the platform. When Nate got off the train, she was there to greet him, and they were both soaking wet as he took her in his arms and asked her to marry him. He said he couldn’t live without her and she knew — had known all along — that she felt the same.
And now, she was going to have to learn to do that — get along without Nate. In fact, she was going to have to learn to get along without just about everything. Her friends, her family, her life, as she had known it, was about to become a thing of the past. The curtain had fallen on her past life and for act two she was center stage, all alone.
Her thoughts turned to little Susie, lying, broken and bleeding, somewhere at the bottom of a cold dark well-shaft. It was September, and the little girl’s only concern should have been starting back to school and what she was going to wear to impress the little boys. She should be looking ahead to the holidays with their decorations and traditional songs.
There was a soft sound from the doorway and Zelda stiffened. “Chirkah?” She trembled at the thought and turned slowly to face the door. Her wide eyes relaxed, somewhat, when Alice stepped through into the light. In her left hand, she held a ball of string and wore an agitated look on her face. She stood, looking at Zelda and said nothing in the way of greeting.
“What brings you back?” Zelda asked, and she tried to smile. “Don’t tell me you’re a closet voyeur, looking for a cheap thrill?”
Zelda’s face froze rigidly in shock as a voice from the hall quietly drifted in past the torches. The tired voice was ragged and hoarse, but she recognized both it and the tune it sang instantly:
“I’m in love with a lady named Zelda Malone,
And I’m seldom alone when she’s near…”
It was an old Groucho Marx bit, but Nate never seemed to tire of teasing her with it. Zelda stumbled to her feet, feeling light-headed, and oddly disconnected. The voice had an eerie, ghost-like quality to it. And, of course… it should. Obviously, it was emanating from the grave, was it not? The strain of her ordeal must have pushed her over the edge completely, and now she was hearing Nate’s voice, singing to her from the great beyond. It was all too ghastly to fathom.
She looked at Alice in disbelief. The woman beamed at her from the middle of the room, a stupid smile spreading from ear to ear. In the flickering light of the torches, she reminded Zelda of a grotesque Gypsy — a fat Madam, about to tell her fortune or go into a trance, acting as a medium for this “dear departed spirit”. After the day she’d had, she had no desire to commune with the dead, even if it was her late husband.
Angrily she challenged Alice. “What the hell is going on?” she demanded, and for a moment she thought she might lose control altogether, but the huge woman held up her hand and spoke.
“Whoa now! Before you go throwin’ yerself at me again, I think you better take a look at this.” She waved Nate on into the room and Susie stepped in behind him.
Tears sprang to Zelda’s eyes and coursed down her cheeks as she flew across the room and into her husband’s arms. He swept her off her feet and crushed her to his chest as he covered her face in hot, sweet kisses. She wrapped her own arms around his neck and locked them there, intending to never let him go again, no matter what danger threatened. The relief that rushed through her soul was like a cool, drenching rain, cascading down upon the smoldering remains of a forest blaze. She left it to wash over her, filling all the empty places hollowed out by despair. She held his kisses until her lungs screamed for air, and then, gasping deliriously, she went back for more.
Dimly, Zelda became aware of someone clutching at her legs and looked down to see Susie, desperately clinging to both her and Nate. Wild, ecstatic amazement filled her as she leaned over to embrace the little girl. A moment ago, she had given both of them up for dead; and now, here they were, alive and well and looking only a little worse for the wear. The three of them, united at last, held each other and whispered the words of endearment reserved for family and loved ones returned from the brink of calamity.
Alice had about as much of this as she could stand, and then decided to cut in. “Okay, you guys,” she scolded. “This ain’t The Love Boat. You better break it up and get your asses in motion. I don’t know how long, for sure, Chirkah and his buddies are gonna be out there howlin’ at the moon… LET’S GO!” She clapped her hands, loudly.
Nate and Zelda pulled back from each other and looked at her. “I thought they were dead,” Zelda exclaimed, her voice full of wonder.
“Right,” Alice said, brusquely. “YOU thought HE was dead… HE thought YOU was dead. I thought SUSIE was dead… WE’RE ALL GONNA BE DEAD AS HELL IF CHIRKAH WAKES UP AND COMES DOWN HERE! SO CAN WE MOVE IT?”
They stood their ground against the blustering woman and held each other tight. Zelda was looking at Alice with adoring eyes, but her face was clouded with confusion. “Why, Alice? Why are you suddenly helping us? I thought you had things figured out for yourself? You were going to go along with the Kophet-kur and their grand scheme. You were going to find a place for yourself in their world… I don’t understand. Why now?”
Alice’s face hardened. She walked slowly over to where the three stood and she looked into Zelda’s eyes. Her enormous body swayed, gently back and forth. Zelda could smell alcohol on her fetid breath. Suddenly her shoulders hunched and she looked away.
“When I came here,” she said quietly, her voice was very small. “… It was a long, long time ago… But, when I was first captured, they killed my husband…” Zelda saw a tear slip slowly along the big woman’s chubby cheek. “When they brought me…they stuck me in this SHITHOLE with the rest of these retarded BITCHES!” Her voice grew louder and angrier. “And they made me… When I first CAME HERE…” Her face was tortured with an inner agony such as only a woman can endure. “When I first came here… I… was… PREGNANT.” Her eyes locked with Zelda’s and their hearts communed.
“What happened to the child?” Zelda whispered, but, deep within, she knew the answer.
Alice looked down at the floor again, and in a voice flat as stale beer, she said, “It was a boy.”
She sniffled loudly and reached beneath her voluminous shift to retrieve a flask. God only knew where she had acquired it, but she was a resourceful woman. The flask was her prized possession in a world of few luxuries. She unscrewed the top and tossed back her head for a blast. For a brief instant, she had sloughed off her gruff façade, lowered her defenses and allowed Zelda a fleeting glimpse of the woman she had been prior to her capture by the Kophet-kur. But, just as quickly. She’d thrown up that curtain again and become Alice, tough, hard-bitten queen of the slave women. In that short time, when she had opened up, Zelda had not exactly come to love this tragic creature, but she had gained an understanding of what had driven her to such a state. Her heart was able to empathize with her, and she felt deep sorrow for her losses. For Zelda saw that she’d lost not just the child and her husband, but more than this, she had lost her sense of self — her ability to hope and dream — all understanding of what can make life worth living. Zelda felt a vague kinship with this woman dawning inside her as she realized that all Alice really required to set her back on the road to sanity was to herself be needed by someone.
“Anyway,” she said, and her voice had regained some of its old sass. “When Nate here made it this far and managed to kill that bitch, Lynette…”
Zelda shot a startled look at Nate who was absorbed in what Alice was saying.
“…I got to thinkin’ maybe I was on the wrong side, after all. Hell, they ain’t gonna let me outa here, no matter HOW nice you are to Chirkah. I was just foolin’ myself. No, the way I figger it, my best shot is to return to civilization…” Here she ducked her head to sniff her own underarm. “That is if they’ll have me.” She smiled her old gap-toothed grin.
“They’ll have you all right,” Zelda returned her smile. “We’ll see to that, won’t we, Nate?” She gazed lovingly up into her husband’s face. Without looking at Alice she spoke again as though in afterthought. “By the way, did I ever tell you, Nate’s a millionaire?”
“No kiddin’?” Alice asked, and her face lit up as the four of them left the chamber and stepped out into the dark hallway.
