CHAPTER 16

IF THIS IS YOUR FIRST VISIT TO THE REDEEMER’S LAW PROJECT, YOU ARE COMING INTO THE STORY ALREADY IN PROGRESS. YOUR EXPERIENCE HERE WILL BE FAR LESS CONFUSING IF YOU USE THE CHAPTER INDEX ON THE RIGHT TO GO BACK TO THE INTRODUCTION. OR AT LEAST TO THE PROLOGUE.

-- DAN

CHAPTER 16

Matt held the door of the club open for Diedra. She flashed him an appreciative smile as she began digging in her purse for her wallet, and Matt felt his heart kick over yet again. Their second date. She’d actually agreed to go out with him again, after that ridiculous display outside her apartment.

They both showed their IDs at the door, paid the cover charge and entered the club. The darkened interior had already half-filled with smoke. It consisted of one large, square room, with a raised stage against the wall opposite the door, and full bars on both the left and right walls. Tables were scattered across the floor, leaving a space open in front of the stage for dancing, and plush chairs and couches tucked themselves into the corners. There were only a half-dozen other people there; the show wouldn’t start for another twenty minutes, and even then the crowd would most likely be small for the opening act. Canned music blared over the PA system, and Matt had to raise his voice.

“Do you want to sit down? Or get something to drink?”

Diedra motioned with her head toward the bar, and Matt followed her.

The bartender was a whip-thin blonde in her mid-twenties whose eyes slid past Diedra to examine Matt boldly. Diedra didn’t wait to be asked what she wanted.

“Amaretto sour.” The bartender nodded and looked back to Matt, expectantly.

“I don’t guess you have Grape Crush?” Matt asked. The blonde gave him a blank stare. “Didn’t think so. That’s fine, I’ll take a ginger ale.”

Turning from the bar, Diedra took his arm and led him toward one of the couches.

“You don’t drink, I take it?” she asked.

“Not too often.”

“Do you mind if I do?”

“No, no, of course not. All things in moderation, as the saying goes.” They reached the couch. It was set back into a small alcove, still affording a clear view of the stage but slightly isolated from the rest of the crowd. Matt hesitated, then gestured out at the floor. “Would you rather sit at one of the tables?”

She plopped down on the couch and motioned for him to join her. He did, sinking back into the spongy cushions. “You can hear yourself think a little better back here,” she said, and giggled at Matt, whose knees were almost on a level with his eyes. “If you can put up with the less-than-firm padding.”

He poked at the couch. “Sort of has that Salvation Army charm, doesn’t it?” She laughed again, that perfect laugh, from that flawless mouth. He turned his head away and scanned the club as he took a small sip of the soda. Neither of them spoke.

Diedra broke the silence. “I still can’t get over that painting of yours. I’ve never known a painting to have that much of an effect on me. I mean, the ones I saw in the gallery were fantastic, but nothing like that one. Are you going to show it?”

“No...I’ve got something special in mind for it.”

“Oh really? What?”

He took another sip of ginger ale, straining to remain casual, and changed the subject. “So, ah, you said your friend would be here tonight?”

She paused, switching gears. “Yeah, his girlfriend’s in the opening act. He said he’d find us and say hello. He sort of plays guitar himself...”

“Sort of?”

“Well, he’s pretty good, really, if he’s just, y’know, dicking around at his house. Get him on stage and he gets all nervous, usually screws something up.” She sipped at her own drink, and set it on the floor. “So how much do you get from selling one of your paintings? I mean, if you don’t mind me asking.”

He let one corner of his mouth quirk upward. “It varies. Depends on what I think they’re worth, what kind of price I put on them. Did you really like ‘Pure Thought’? The crystal tree one?”

She nodded vigorously. “Yeah! I mean, like I said, I’ve never seen a painting before that made me feel so much. And that one really did.”

Well. She’d just given him the perfect opening. Acting on a decision he’d made earlier in the day, he took a deep breath and said, “So you liked it better than the other one?”

Her smile froze. Matt experienced a touch of sadistic pleasure at catching her so flat-footed, and immediately felt ashamed of himself.

“The ones at the gallery? Which one do you mean?”

He calmly drank from his cup. “The other one I had in my bedroom. You know, the one you saw before I came home the other day. When you were in my apartment.” She looked like a deer caught in headlights. “If I’d known you were there I wouldn’t have walked around almost naked. I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

She half rose from the couch, shifting between guilt and anger. “Look, I don’t know what you’re doing by—I mean, I’m sorry that...” When his face didn’t change, she sank back down onto the cushion. “How’d you know I was there?”

“You left a couple of signs.” He shifted around to face her directly, folding one leg under himself. “I’m not upset. Not really.”

She looked suspicious. “Then why did you pretend you didn’t know? All this time? Through that whole date?”

He stared down at his soft drink. “I’m not sure why I didn’t go ahead and ask you if you’d been there. In my bedroom, I mean. I guess I was waiting to see if you brought it up first. But I asked you out because I wanted to ask you out, the same reason I asked you out again for tonight. I was going to talk to you about it before, out at the statue, but I couldn’t ever seem to find the right time. I didn’t want to ruin things.”

Matt looked up, into her narrowed eyes, and shrugged. He felt the heat rising into his face, and wondered if she could see it in the semi-darkness. “I know, it’s not exactly standard for the beginning of a rel—” He stopped. “Um. Well.”

Neither of them spoke for several seconds, and Matt finally said, “Awkward, huh?”

She slumped backward and nestled into the corner of the couch. “Sort of, yeah.” Matt started to say something else when he saw her face darken. She frowned, as though remembering something unpleasant, and sat back up. “Well, okay, I’m glad that’s out in the open, but...well, how come you weren’t wet? When you came in? It was pouring down rain outside.”

“I’d just gone downstairs to take out my trash.” The dumpster for the LaCroix was in back, outside an access door. “I just stuck my head out and pitched the bags around the door, y’know, to try to keep from getting wet.” He paused. “I took the stairs...you must’ve just missed me.”

Diedra’s eyes got wider, and she smacked herself on the forehead. “Of course. Of course I did.” She laughed self-consciously. “Okay, okay, I’m feeling like a real moron here. I mean, I guess you know why I was spooked when you came in. That first painting was, like, pure nightmare.”

He grinned and looked bashful.

She went on. “But how come you didn’t notice the door was unlocked? When you came back? You had your keys with you.”

That stopped Matt cold. He slowly opened his mouth, wondering what was going to come out of it, when an unfamiliar voice sounded from over his shoulder.

“Diedra! Hey! Glad you could make it!”

Diedra looked up, grinned hugely, and rose off the couch with her arms outstretched. Matt turned and saw a rail-thin, long-haired young man in ratty jeans and a blue T-shirt with the Superman emblem on the front. He and Diedra embraced briefly. He turned to Matt, flashed what looked like every one of his teeth, and stuck out one long, bony hand.

“Hey! I’m Canaan.”

Matt stood and returned the handshake. Canaan was almost as tall as Matt, and didn’t look a day over nineteen. Matt figured he must have outweighed the kid by sixty pounds at least.

“Matt Sinclair.”

“Canaan’s older sister and I went to school together,” Diedra said. “I sort of adopted Canaan along the way.”

“Yeah, hey listen, I’d love to stay and talk.” Canaan’s voice practically bubbled with excitement. “But you won’t believe this. Kate’s guitarist has the flu, and I talked them into letting me play tonight!”

Matt watched Diedra’s face. She was clearly surprised, and didn’t look as if she thought that was a good idea. Before she could say anything, though, Canaan shook Matt’s hand again. “I’ve got to get backstage now. Nice meeting you, man! Wish me luck, guys!” He sprinted away.

Diedra watched him go, and shook her head. “This is going to be a disaster.” She sat back down, and Matt followed. “Kate takes this band pretty seriously, and if Canaan makes them look bad she’ll kill him.”

Matt pretended to watch the stage, but kept glancing at Diedra out of the corner of his eye. Maybe she’d forget what they had been talking about...?

“So,” she began. “What about that door?”

Crap.

“Well, I’ll tell you, but it’s sort of embarrassing.”

She leaned forward, rested her chin on one fist. “Yeah?”

“Sometimes I just forget to lock it. I mean, y’know, the building’s got security, it’s got cameras and what-not, so it’s not like my door just opens onto the street or anything. Plus, where I grew up I never had to lock my door at all. So sometimes I just forget. When I came back yesterday I just figured I’d left it unlocked again, and nothing was missing, so I didn’t think about it.”

She fell silent. He didn’t think she believed him and, turning it over in his head, he wouldn’t have believed such a lame explanation either, but before she could say anything a voice crashed out over the PA. Easily five times louder than the canned music, it made Matt wince and wish for ear plugs.

“All right!” the voice said. Matt turned toward the stage and saw that a tall, bony redheaded girl stood at the center mike, a big guitar slung across her chest. The other members of the band were all guys—kids, really. A swarthy, shirtless young man with long, unkempt hair and a fretless bass took up his position near the west corner of the stage. The drummer came out and sat down, also shirtless, with shaggy blonde surfer hair and enormous biceps. He grinned at the girl and twirled his sticks in his fingers. Then, finally, Canaan appeared, clutching a blinding white Les Paul six-string. He already looked nervous, and the harsh lights made the sweat on his forehead sparkle.

“We’re Flay,” the girl, Kate, barked into the mike. She turned and nodded to the drummer, who cracked his sticks together, one, two, one two three four, and the band launched into their first song.

The drummer and the bassist seemed at least adequate. Their pounding rhythms nicely complemented Kate’s vocals, which she growled out in an oddly melodic hybrid of Alanis Morrissette and Kim Gordon. The song progressed smoothly through the intro, which did not involve guitar at all—and then Canaan started playing.

Diedra mouthed the words, “Oh, no.” Matt couldn’t hear her at all over the din, and his ears started to hurt. He squinted, tried to decide whether or not to stick his fingers in his ears, and listened to Canaan’s playing.

Canaan made mistakes almost from the first note. To begin with he couldn’t find the rhythm of the song, and then when he did find it he couldn’t get the right chord. What probably would have been a good song instead became unlistenable. Kate turned from the mike halfway through and gave Canaan a look that, to Matt’s surprise, didn’t kill him where he stood. Canaan saw it, though, and flinched.

Suddenly Diedra pulled Matt up from the couch.

“Come on,” she shouted into his ear through cupped hands. “I can’t take this anymore.”

Matt allowed himself to be led outside, and felt sorry for the kid.

# # #

The cool night air smelled faintly of pine needles as they walked back to Matt’s car and drove to Hammerfield Park. Intended to be a safe, family-friendly alternative to Piedmont Park, the carefully landscaped Hammerfield spent its days filled with college students, small children accompanied by watchful parents, and dogs, along with a lot of Frisbees. Squirrels virtually infested the well-maintained trees, and ducks quacked in the man-made pond.

By night the park wore a slightly more forbidding face but, according to the Atlanta safety commission, stayed well enough lit and was patrolled by police frequently enough to afford safe passage to joggers and others out for evening strolls.

So Matt and Diedra strolled, following a pine needle-covered walking trail.

After a few moments he tentatively reached out his hand, and almost sighed with relief when she took it with as much warmth as she had on their first date.

He listened to her voice, and as she talked about the times she used to have with Canaan’s sister Lauren, he suddenly thought of Glory. He’d found himself sometimes staring at the ring finger of his left hand. When he let it, the bareness of it struck at him like a phantom pain. Blonde hair floating around her head in natural ringlets, ocean green eyes ... Gloria Kendrick, her name was, before she left it behind.

“I’m not giving up my own identity.” She’d stated her ideas on the matter very clearly. “I’m joining myself to you. To our new life together. It’s a thing of binding, like the ring, like the vows, just not for the old traditional reasons. Not about obedience. It’s my commitment to you. My commitment to us.”

Diedra squeezed his hand, and he jerked back to the present. As they walked, she turned his hand over in her own, running silky fingers down each fold and line.

“This doesn’t feel too much like the hand of an artist,” she said. He was glad of the change in subject, since he hadn’t heard a word she’d said in several minutes.

“Well, uh...I work out a little.”

“A little. Really.”

He smiled, but took his hand back and shoved it in his pocket. A not very comfortable silence followed, until Matt said, “Hey, how’s your mother? I know she’s on a trip somewhere, but I never heard any details.”

Diedra’s face sagged. She crossed her arms, hugged herself. “She’s taking care of my aunt and uncle in Chicago. They were in a car wreck.”

“Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t know it was anything like that.”

Diedra tilted her head to one side, stared off at the night sky. They came to a bench, and she moved to sit down. Matt joined her, but after a second’s consideration left a good foot and a half between them.

“They’re all right, or at least they’re going to be. Aunt Tasneem in particular needs a lot of time to recuperate, and Uncle Chelum’s pretty old, he can’t get around too well, even when he’s okay. So Mom went up there to help. And I’m here, until they get better.” She laughed. Short, derisively. “Or maybe longer than that.”

“Yeah?”

“I...didn’t really plan to be anywhere. Not in any practical way, at least. Growing up, Mom always told me how important it is to get a good, steady, paying job. She said if you had that, then you had no limits. As long as you had a solid base under you, you could reach for the stars.” She exaggerated the last words. “I didn’t buy that. I wanted to be a writer, make my living selling stories. So...after I graduated with my nice little BA in English, I worked for a while in a bookstore while I submitted stuff. I figured, hey, every writer goes through this, getting back rejection slips, it’s just part of the game, paying my dues, I’ll get published soon enough. But...I didn’t.”

She paused. Matt waited for her.

“Every once in a while an editor wrote me a personal letter and encouraged me to keep writing, but by and large I got form letters. My favorite one had, ‘Dear ... ’ and then a blank line, and some intern misspelled my name on it. Anyway, Mom kept telling me to come back and work for her, she said I could make money during the day and write at night, and I could live in one of her apartments for a cut rate—and, now that I think about it, that was a fantastic deal. Any other half-starved sales clerk probably would have pounced on it. But I still turned her down. We fought about it for...I guess it was most of a year.

“Then Aunt Tasneem lost control of her car and ran off the road. I think, probably, what happened was there was a spider in the car. She was always terrified of spiders. She won’t admit it, about the spider, but she’s a very good driver, very safe, and in the middle of a dry, sunny afternoon she just ran off the road and into somebody’s front yard and hit a tree.”

Diedra rocked back and forth on the bench. “She wasn’t hurt bad...I mean, she was hurt bad, but it’s nothing permanent. She’s pretty tough. But she needs constant care, and Mom volunteered. So I packed up my cat and my furniture, and that’s why I’m here, because she can’t be, and she needed someone to run the building. So she was right all along.”

Diedra leaned back. “Not a very interesting story, I guess. I’m just sort of a slacker who finally saw the light and realized she was living in a capitalist society.”

Matt said, “Interesting stories are overrated.”

“Ha. Well. Enough about me. Let’s talk about you some more.”

Before he could reply, a shrill, rasping scream punched out of the darkness from somewhere to their right.



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