Pet Sematary - Stephen King [179]
Stop, he whispered and shuddered at the sound of his own voice. He would go out into the kitchen, he decided, and make himself breakfast just as if it were any ordinary day. A bachelor breakfast, full of comforting cholesterol. A couple of fried-egg sandwiches with mayo and a slice of Bermuda onion on each one. He smelled sweaty and dirty and cruddy, but he would save the shower for later; right now getting undressed seemed like too much work, and he was afraid he might have to get the scalpel out of his bag and actually cut the leg of the pants open in order to allow his bloated knee to escape. A hell of a way to treat good instruments, but none of the knives in the house would cut the heavy jeans fabric, and Rachels sewing scissors certainly would not do the trick.
But first, breakfast.
So he crossed the living room and then detoured into the front entry and looked out at the small blue car in Juds driveway. It was covered with dewfall, which meant it had been there for some time. Church was still on the roof but not sleeping. He appeared to be staring right at Louis with his ugly yellow-green eyes.
Louis stepped back hurriedly, as if someone had caught him peeking.
He went into the kitchen, rattled out a frying pan, put it on the stove, got eggs from the fridge. The kitchen was bright and crisp and clear. He tried to whistle-a whistle would bring the morning into its proper focus-but he could not. Things looked right, but they werent right. The house seemed dreadfully empty, and last nights work weighed on him. Things were wrong, awry; he felt a shadow hovering, and he was afraid.
He limped into the bathroom and took a couple of aspirin with a glass of orange juice. He was working his way back to the stove when the telephone rang.
He did not answer it immediately but turned and looked at it, feeling slow and stupid, a sucker in some game which he was only now realizing he did not understand in the least.
Dont answer that, you dont want to answer that because thats the bad news, thats the end of the leash that leads around the corner and into the darkness, and I dont think you want to
see whats on the other end of that leash, Louis, I really dont think you do, so dont answer that phone, run, run now, the cars in the garage, get in it and take off, but dont answer that phone- He crossed the room and picked it up, standing there with one
hand on the dryer as he had so many times before, and it was Irwin Goldman, and even as Irwin said hello Louis saw the tracks crossing the kitchen-small, muddy tracks-and his heart seemed to freeze in his chest, and he believed he could feel his eyeballs swelling in his head, starting from their sockets; he believed that if he could have seen himself in a mirror at that moment he would have seen a face out of a seventeenth-century painting of a lunatic asylum. They were Gages tracks, Gage had been here, he had been here in the night, and so where was he now?
Its Irwin, Louis Louis? Are you there? Hello?
Hello, Irwin, he said, and already he knew what Irwin was going to say. He understood the blue car. He understood everything. The leash the leash going into the darkness he was moving fast along it now, hand over hand. Ah, if he could drop it before he saw what was at the end! But it was his leash. He had bought it.
For a moment I thought wed been cut off, Goldman was saying.
No, the phone slipped out of my hand, Louis said. His voice was calm.
Did Rachel make it home last night?
Oh yes, Louis said, thinking of the blue car, Church perched on top of it, the blue car that was so still. His eye traced the muddy footprints on the floor.
I ought to speak to her, Goldman said. Right away. Its about Eileen.
Ellie? What about Ellie?
I really think Rachel-
Rachels not here right now, Louis said harshly. Shes gone to the store for bread and milk. What about Ellie? Come on, Irwin!
We had to take her to the hospital,