Tommy Nightmare(47)
When she stepped out of her apartment, Tommy cranked the engine of his motorcycle. The sound drew her attention, and she smiled immediately when she saw him. Then she seemed to remember herself, and the smile disappeared.
She turned away from him and walked toward the bus stop at the front of the complex.
Tommy swooped out until he was alongside her, then slowed down and walked his bike along with her, the engine grumbling beneath him.
“Hi, Esmeralda,” he said.
“You know my name.” She kept walking, kept trying to hide her smile.
“I couldn't search the whole country for you without learning your name,” he said. “Esmeralda Rios.”
“The whole country? Where did you start?”
“Forth Worth.”
“Wow.” She laughed. “That was years ago. Did you stop in Albuquerque, too?”
“Yep.”
“Arizona?”
“Flagstaff.”
“I am impressed.” She gave him a sidelong look. “And a little creeped out.”
“But you remember me,” he said.
“A little. I don't even remember your name.”
“I never told you.”
When she reached the graffiti-coated Plexiglas bus shelter, she finally turned to look him full on in the face. Tommy felt something move in his heart—but he pushed the feeling down quickly. He needed to handle his business, not stare all droopy-eyed at this gorgeous girl.
“Want a ride?” he asked.
“I like the bus.”
“My bike's a lot nicer,” he said. “Cleaner, too.”
She eyed his stolen Harley. “I doubt that.”
“More fun.”
The bus approached down Sepulveda, pausing only one intersection away to load and unload passengers.
“I don't ride with strangers,” Esmeralda said.
“My name is Tommy.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“You have beautiful eyes,” he said.
Her eyes responded to the compliment by rolling upward. “You are so original,” she said, but she was smiling again.
The bus trundled towards them.
“Do you want the ride?” Tommy asked. He could take off his glove, grab her arm and make her do anything he said. But he didn't want to do that. He wanted her to choose to come.
“I still don't know your last name.”
“It's Krueger,” he said. It was a surname he often used. His favorite, actually.
“That doesn't sound very Spanish to me.” The bus arrived, and the door folded open. Esmeralda looked at the steps inside. “My mother won't approve of it.”
“We can change it. I just made it up, anyway.”
She laughed. “You chose to be named after a movie monster?”
“I always kind of identified with him.”
“You are crazy.” The bus door folded, and the bus lurched away. “Look, you made me miss my bus. Now you must take me to work.”
“Hop on.”
Esmeralda slid into the seat behind him. She wrapped her arms around his waist. He felt her fingers on his abdominal muscles, pressing him tight through his shirt, and now it was his turn to smile.
“You don't have an extra helmet,” she said.
“I'll have to fix that.” He took off his helmet and passed it back to her. “Just pull the chin strap under—”
“I know. You're not the first boy on a bike I've dated.”
“Are we dating now?”
“I didn't mean to say that. Okay, I'm ready.”
Tommy gunned the bike and they shot out into the road. He curved steeply, almost tipping over on one side, and she squealed and clamped her arms tight around him.
He straightened up the bike and drove.
The funeral home was only about ten minutes away, but when they reached it, Tommy didn't pull into the parking lot. He kept going, not stopping until the next red light.
“You missed it,” Esmeralda said.
“Take the day off,” he said. “We’ll have fun instead.”
“But I told Mr. Gonzales I would come in for a few hours.”
“Let the dead bury the dead,” Tommy said. “Isn't that what they say?”
“It’s a bad plan,” Esmeralda said. “The dead don’t work very hard.”
The light turned green, and Tommy opened up the throttle.
She never asked him to turn back.
Jenny dreamed she was Euanthe again, bringing food to her new master’s dining hall, accompanied by a few other slave girls. One girl carried a platter of roast lamb, another a skin of wine, another a loaf of bread. Euanthe herself carried a wooden platter with an assortment of olives.
The gray-eyed lady and her husband reclined on couches near the fire. Her husband had the same gray eyes that she did, as if husband and wife were somehow related.