Yellow Mama E zine

KAPUT

 

by

 

Cindy Rosmus

 

1988

 

 

          “You’re sure, right?” my cousin Asunta said. “Once it’s done, that’s that.” Just like that lady at the clinic.

           No, I thought, shivering. I’m not. But it was over six weeks. If I waited any longer . . . “Let’s just go!”

           She started the car. My back to her, I faced the window. I couldn’t get far enough away. Right now, I hated her.

           You fucked her boyfriend, a little voice sneered. The night he died. It’s his baby . . .

           But she didn’t know that.

            Just that it was best to get rid of it.

           Right?

           How could I have a baby? Working at Sucato’s, our family pizzeria. Living in their house. Who wanted a baby crying, whining, shitting all over? Diapers . . . Changing its diapers in Sucato’s cramped ladies’ room. I was a wreck now, from not sleeping enough. Who needed a baby keeping us all up, every night?

           But it was Tommy’s . . .

           I wanted it so bad.

           “Your first time,” Asunta said, when I’d admitted that part. “What rotten luck.”

           Rotten? My heart swelled. No, bitch, tragic. How within a half hour Tommy was shot by Asunta’s jealous ex, Louie, ‘cos he couldn’t tell us apart. How I’d still felt Tommy inside me as he lay dead in the snow. Christmas lights twinkling away. Bloody, fresh snow that turned to ice. Then more snow came, weeks later. Now, staring out the car window, it had all iced up once again.

          Tommy . . .

          And those dreams . . . When I could sleep. Sometimes dreams within dreams, where I was in his arms, squeezed tight. “Baby,” he said into my hair.

          But also him standing there, watching me dream!

          Huge, dark eyes, larger than life, nearly swallowing me. One Tommy nude, feeling like warm skin, and hair. The other in jeans, and leather jacket, looking really pissed. Arms folded over the hole in his chest. When this Tommy said, “Baby,” I got chills. Even in my dream, I had goosebumps.

         Tommy . . .

         When I reached out, this other Tommy turned away. Then vanished.

         I deserved it. For heading to “that place” with Asunta.

         It would cost everything I had saved. Even worse, that tiny ball of life; the “alien” that made me puke in the mornings; my constant, sweet, silent companion, would soon be gone. Kaput. All that was left of Tommy would really have vanished.

         “You sleepy?” Asunta said. She was used to that.

         I tried not to move. If I didn’t answer, she’d think I dozed off.

         Maybe I did.

         ‘Cos now Tommy was driving.

         “Baby?” This time I said it.

         He wouldn’t look at me. Eyes on the road, like he was still alive, and no way could we have an accident.

          “I’m sorry.” I started to cry.

          His shrug hurt me. But I deserved that, too. I’d gotten him killed. That one time we fucked, under the Christmas tree, downstairs, instead of safely up in my room. From the window, Louie thought I was Asunta. And I should’ve been. Tommy was her guy, not mine.

          Asunta would’ve taken him right upstairs.

          My wracking sobs didn’t move Tommy. In all my dreams, not once had he blamed me for his death.

          I grabbed his arm. In the leather jacket, it was hard, and cold. Like a corpse’s. At the wake, I hid in the back as Tommy’s mother and Asunta wailed up front. I never went near the coffin.

          Ahead were so many ice-covered trees. Like the whole world was freezing me out.

          “Go ahead!” I said. “Crash.” No response. “I want to die. Please, take me . . . take us both with you!”

          His lips moved, silently. Then, “It don’t work like that.”  

          I rested my face against the seat. My eyes felt heavy. “Then will you take me home?”

          As he made the U-turn, I thought he smiled. The arm I clung to felt warm and strong. Safe, once he wrapped it around me.

          “What the fuck?” Asunta said. “Sandy! Where’re you going?”

          At the light, I’d thrown open the door. I got out of the car and started walking, too fast, across the icy street.

          “Get back in the car!”

          I ignored her. Smiling, I just kept walking, slower now.

          And carefully, like I was made out of glass.

 

  

THE END

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           Cindy originally hails from the Ironbound section of Newark, NJ, once voted the “unfriendliest city on the planet.” She talks like “Anybodys” from West Side Story and everybody from Saturday Night Fever. Her noir/horror/ bizarro stories have been published in the coolest places, such as Shotgun Honey; Megazine; Dark Dossier; The Rye Whiskey Review, Under the Bleachers, Pulp Asylum, Punk Noir, The Yard and Rock and a Hard Place. She is the editor/art director of Yellow Mama. She’s published seven collections of short stories. Cindy is a Gemini, a Christian, and an animal rights advocate.

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Bernice Holtzman’s paintings and collages have appeared in shows at various venues in Manhattan, including the Back Fence in Greenwich Village, the Producer’s Club, the Black Door Gallery on W. 26th St., and one other place she can’t remember, but it was in a basement, and she was well received. She is the Assistant Art Director for Yellow Mama.