Needful Things - Stephen King [113]
At quarter to ten on Sunday morning, Nettle Cobb drew on her coat and buttoned it swiftly. An expression of grim determination was stamped on her face. She was standing in her kitchen. Raider was sitting on the floor, looking up at her as if to ask if she really meant to go through with it this time.
"Yes, I really mean it," she told him.
Raider thumped his tail against the floor, as if to say he knew she could do it.
"I've made a nice lasagna for Polly, and I'm going to take it to her. My lampshade is locked up in the armoire, and I know it's locked, I don't need to keep coming back to check because I know it in my head.
That crazy Polish woman isn't going to keep me prisoner in my own house. If I see her on the street, I'll give her what-for! I warned her!"
She had to go out. She had to, and she knew it. She hadn't left the house in two days, and she had come to realize that the longer she put it off, the harder it would become. The longer she sat in the living room with the shades pulled down, the harder it would get to ever raise them again. She could feel the old confused terror creeping into her thoughts.
So she had gotten up early this morning-at five o'clock!-and had made a nice lasagna for Polly, just the way she liked it, with plenty of spinach and mushrooms. The mushrooms were canned, because she hadn't dared go out to the market last night, but she thought it had turned out very well despite that. It was now sitting on the counter, the top of the pan covered with aluminum foil.
She picked it up and marched through the living room to the door.
"You be a good boy, Raider. I'll be back in an hour. Unless Polly gives me coffee, and then it might be a little longer. But I'll be fine. I don't have a thing to worry about. I didn't do anything to that crazy Polish woman's sheets, and if she bothers me, I'll give her the very dickens."
Raider uttered a stern bark to show he understood and believed.
She opened the door, peeked out, saw nothing. Ford Street was as deserted as only a small-town street can be early on Sunday morning.
In the distance, one church-bell was calling Rev. Rose's Baptists to worship and another was summoning Father Brigham's Catholics.
Gathering all her courage, Nettle stepped out into the Sunday sunshine, set the pan of lasagna down on the step, pulled the door closed, and locked it. Then she took her housekey and scratched it up her forearm, leaving a thin red mark. As she stooped to pick up the pan again she thought, Now when you get halfway down the block-maybe even sooner-you'll start thinking that you really didn't lock the door after all. But you did. You set the lasagna down to do it.
And if you still can't believe it, just look at your arm and remember that you made that scratch with your very own housekey after you used it to lock the house. Remember that, Nettle, and you'll be Just fine when the doubts start to creep in.
This was a wonderful thought, and using the key to scratch her arm had been a wonderful idea. The red mark was something concrete, and for the first time in the last two days (and mostly sleepless nights), Nettle really did feel better. She marched down to the sidewalk, her head high, her lips pressed together so tightly that they almost disappeared. When she reached the sidewalk, she looked both ways for the crazy Polish woman's little yellow car. If she saw it, she intended to walk right up to it and tell the crazy Polish woman to leave her alone. There wasn't a sign of it, though.
The only vehicle in sight was an old orange truck parked up the street, and it was empty.
Good.
Nettle set sail for Polly Chalmers's house, and when the doubts assailed her, she remembered that the carnival glass lampshade was locked up, Raider was on guard, and the front door was locked.
Especially that last. The front door was locked, and she only had to look at the fading red mark on her arm to prove it to herself.
So Nettle marched on with her head high, and when she reached the corner, she turned it without looking back.
2
When the nutty woman was