Christine - Stephen King [162]
'Yeah, I will. Listen, Mi - '
Click.
He stood in the booth, listening stupidly to the sound of nothing at all. His father was gone. There wasn't even a dial tone because it was a dumb fucking phone booth.
He dug into his pocket and spread his change out on the little metal shelf where he could look at it. He picked up a dime, almost dropped it, and at last got it into the slot. He felt sick and overheated. He felt as if he had been very efficiently disowned.
He dialled Leigh's number from memory.
Mrs Cabot picked the phone up and recognized his voice immediately. Her pleasant and rather sexy come-hither-thou-fascinating-stranger phone voice became instantly hard. Arnie had had his last chance with her, that voice said, and he had blown it.
'She doesn't want to talk to you and she doesn't want to see you,' she said.
'Mrs Cabot, please, if I could just - '
'I think you've done enough,' Mrs Cabot said coolly. 'She came in crying the other night and she's been crying off and on ever since. She had some sort of a an experience with you the last time you and she went out, and I only pray it wasn't what I thought it was. I - '
Arnie felt hysterical laughter bubbling up inside him. Leigh had almost choked to death on a hamburger, and her mother was afraid Arnie had tried to rape her.
'Mrs Cabot, I have to talk to her.'
'I'm afraid not.'
He tried to think of something else to say, some way to get past the dragon at the gate. He felt a little like a Fuller Brush salesman trying to get in to see the lady of the house. His tongue wouldn't move. He would have made a lousy salesman. There was going to be that hard click and then smooth silence again.
Then he heard the telephone change hands, Mrs Cabot said something in sharp protest, and Leigh said something back; it was too muffled for him to catch. Then Leigh's voice said, 'Arnie?'
'Hi,' he said. 'Leigh, I just wanted to call and tell you how sorry I was about - '
'Yes,' Leigh said 'I know you were, and I accept your apology, Arnie. But I won't - I can't go out with you anymore. Unless things change.'
'Ask me something easy,' he whispered.
'That's all I - ' Her voice sharpened, moved slightly away from the telephone. 'Mom, please stop hanging over me!' Her mother said something that sounded disgruntled, there was a pause, and then Leigh's voice again, low. 'That's all I can say, Arnie. I know how crazy it sounds, but I still think your car tried to kill me the other night. I don't know how something like that could be, but no matter how I work it over in my mind, it comes out seeing that that was how it was. I know that's how it was. It's got you, doesn't it?'
'Leigh, if you'll pardon my French, that's pretty fucking stupid. It's a car! Can you spell that C-A-R, car! There's nothing - '
'Yes,' she said, and now her voice was wavering toward tears. 'It's got you, she's got you, and I guess nobody can get you free except you.'
His back suddenly awoke and began to throb, sending pain out in a sickish radiation that seemed to echo and amplify in his head.
'Isn't that the truth of it, Arnie?'
He didn't, couldn't, answer.
'Get rid of it,' Leigh said. 'Please. I read about that Repperton boy in the paper this morning, and - '
'What's that got to do with anything?' Arnie croaked. And for the second time: 'That was an accident.'
'I don't know what it was. Maybe I don't want to know. But it isn't us I'm worried about anymore. It's you, Arnie. I'm scared for you. You ought to - no, you have to get rid of it.'
Arnie whispered, 'Just say you won't dump me, Leigh. Okay?'
Now she was even closer to crying - or perhaps she was already doing it. 'Promise me, Arnie. You have to promise me and then you have to do it. Then we we can see. Promise me you'll get rid of that car. It's all I want from you, nothing else.'
He closed his eyes and saw Leigh walking home from school. And a block down, idling at the