Still October 18th

After a dinner of roasted bird/dog, Louise told True and I to excuse ourselves so all the adults could 'talk'. True disappeared, but I hoped to catch up with her. However, the den was dark and empty when I got to it. In the interest of not seeming like a creep, I decided to let the girl be. Outright looking for her would appear strange at so early a juncture.

I popped in a DVD (if you must know, it was Watchmen) and sat down on the couch. While the opening scenes rolled to the tune of "The Time's They are a Changin'", I heard other notes interrupting Dylan's song. The tinkling sounds were coming from the sitting room. I got up and headed to the source of the melody.

Dun Dun Dun.

A piano. I'd forgotten there was a piano in the house. Sitting behind the black monstrosity was True. She had finally found something to do. The song she was playing wasn't "Taps" either. Her song of choice was more complex than that. Some classical number I didn't know the name of.

Since her shower, True had become more beautiful. Her mop of hair was clean and combed. Mop isn't the way I would describe her hair now; it's a tumble of blonde ringlets. They look soft and I'm fascinated at the thought of twisting my finger around one of her curls. Goodness, do I have some sort of hair fetish? Wonder if there's a formal term for something like that.

Feeling bold, I sat on the piano bench alongside my newest crush. She didn't acknowledge that I was there.

"What song are you playing?" Plink, plink, plink.

No answer.

I was about to ask her another question. Thankfully, I was spared the further embarrassment of talking to myself because from the adjacent dining room, I heard Michael ask Gloria,

"What's your story?"

"Well, a few months back, True and I went from a family of four to just two."

Louise: "I'm sorry.

"It's okay. We've all lost someone, but I suppose what your husband wants to know is how that came about for True and me. How we came to be knocking on your front gate."

Michael cleared his throat. "If you don't mind, ma'am."

"Please, call me Gloria." I envisioned her stained smile and cringed.

I looked to see if True was listening as well, but she was getting up from the bench and walking away. Maybe she didn't want to rehash bad memories. However, I wasn't too proud to continue eavesdropping. I wanted to know their story as much as Michael did.

Gloria clinked her silverware around on her plate and went on: "We had a nice apartment in the city, uptown you know."

"Yea, we can imagine." Louise said, probably thinking back to her and Michael's uptown lifestyle.

"Well then, you know we couldn't stay there after things turned...ugly."

Ugly, huh. That's a good word for it as any.

"We were able to get away in our summer home. It's about a hundred miles from here. Everything was great, for a few days. One night, four men broke into our house. They killed my husband and fifteen-year-old son, Greg. True and I were lucky in the scheme of things; all they did was rape and beat us, and then they left. Once we'd recovered, we resolved to move on. Our home wasn't secure, and those men or more men like them could have come later.

For weeks, we were able to hide out in a nearby cottage. When we ran out of food, I told True we had to leave. On our travels, we saw plenty of odd creatures and bad men. We kept out of sight. Looking for food and shelter, we dared to knock on every door we came across. Sometimes the houses were empty, and sometimes they weren't. Some of the people inside were hospitable, while others would help us in exchange for...favors."

"Oh." Michael said.

"I never let them have True, but I did what I had to do for the both of us."

Louise said, "We're not judging you, Gloria."

"Thanks" I could hear her fake smile from where I was. "Besides demons and vagrants, we found cannibals. We barely escaped with our skin from the house of one man who wanted to eat me, and keep True as his pet. He wasn't the last crazy bastard we happened upon. We were on the run from yet another crazy when we saw your mailbox. Thank God for that, and thank God your husband was kind enough to let us into your home." I heard Gloria's voice thicken with tears.

Being unable to see her performance, I thought that the tone of her story was just that; a story. One storyteller-can-spot-the-next sort of thing.

~*~