Chapter 5: Mabel the Mitsubishi

Her car had a dent in the right side of the hood. But far worse were the flecks of red rusty colored blood. Adrian closed her eyes tightly at the sight, but it was no good, the image was right there in her eyelids. Maybe one day she would forget the awful afternoon. She doubted this very much, but hope was a tempting thing. The engine engaged at the flick of her wrist. The radio began to pump out some popular garbage. Adrian reached out and stifled the noise reflexively, wincing at the intrusion into her black thoughts. The Mitsubishi didn’t seem to care that it was nearly turned into a murder weapon. Actually it seemed cheery. Of course she was personifying the damn thing, but it was hard to be the carefully cultivated Ms. Adrian Shore in times of despair. She didn’t much care that her thoughts had strayed from reasonable logic and adult opinion to childish fantasy about Thomas the Train and Mabel the Mitsubishi nearly turned Murderer.
Afternoon had faded into evening while she was waiting to see the girl. She drove ten to fifteen miles under the speed limit all the way back to the stylish loft she shared with Isabelle’s rouge father. She was just turning the key into the door when it flew open.
“Jesus.”
Michael was standing in the door wearing his crumpled up white collared shirt. The lines of his face were drawn down in angry worry.
“Where were you?”
Then without waiting for a response, probably because professors are notorious for this very habit, Michael Sands continued to lecture. He didn’t step aside for Adrian to come into the flat. He simply talked.
“I don’t know why I paid for a phone you never choose to answer. If you remember correctly we had a reservation tonight for Oh’ange. I’ve been waiting for you for three and a half hours now. Wasting my time. I hope that you have a perfectly fabulous excuse for this…”
“Is a car wreck satisfactory Professor Sands?”
“oh.”
He ushered her inside like something that might break. The embarrassment flushing his stubble covered cheeks a rosy pink. He had forgotten some elementary life lesson; there was oft a rhyme and a reason in human behavior. Especially when it came to those who one loved and trusted. Often bizarre conduct had a solid explanation. It was mad to jump to mistrust before concern. He paced about in nervous penance as Adrian sank into the sage colored sofa like a rag doll.
“I met your daughter today.”
Michael blinked in a confused way and rubbed the bridge of his nose where his black-rimmed glasses sat. Guilt he thought he had smothered came crawling back and wrung his heart like a dirty dishrag. His empty stomach flopped around madly and he froze up. His smooth hands and long fingers began to fiddle about with his shirt, a nervous habit that he didn’t even register most often.
“Why?”
“The Mitsubishi nearly killed her, she’s in the hospital.”
Adrian knew she was assigning blame to the car and once again personifying the damn thing, but that was how her words came out. She could hardly hide the deed she had committed. Adrian might be several things, but she was not a liar.
Michael’s face contorted in confused horror. He literally froze in mid-pace and his mouth hung open. He bore a strange resemblance to a feeding goldfish. The bugging out eyes, the slack jaw, it was uncanny. Adrian almost laughed at this metaphor. She was in the midst of a nervous breakdown and feeling rather hysterical.
“What hospital?”
His face was geisha pale. Adrian felt like a worm, a slimy nasty critter that the average soul would step on without hesitation or regret. It was an accident. A freakish urge to beg for forgiveness, to proclaim loudly and honestly that she was sorry, nearly possessed her. She smothered it with great effort and answered.
“St. Clements”
“Adrian, are you okay?”
He asked in the middle of yanking his brown jacket over the rumpled dress shirt. He pulled the zipper up to his chin and grabbed a red plaid scarf from the coat rack. The truck keys were already dangling from his hand. They clinked together softly, impatient to go.
“Yes. I’m okay.”
He nodded in reply and nearly ran out the front door.

Chapter 4: A savior and a revelation

Adrian sat in a plastic chair waiting for news about the girl. She sat and shook, thinking at first, but then sinking into a deep comatose despair. A white-coated man briskly walked into the small room. Adrian lifted her chin and asked with her eyes.

“She’s fine.”

Adrian wanted to jump out of seat and yell with joy.

“Can I see her?” She surprised her self with the question.

He looked startled. “Um…well, I suppose it would be alright.”

She followed him down the pale hallway. She didn’t know why she wanted to see the girl. Maybe to make sure she was alive, maybe because the doctor’s words weren’t as powerful as her memory of that sickening thud and the blood leaking into the snow.

Adrian opened the door to #513.

Isabelle had just managed to locate the red button when the door opened. She dropped it because she was incredibly jumpy at that moment in time. The slight rattle of breath ceased as a girl walked in the door. Isabelle turned misty eyes towards her savior and was shocked to see that woman by her bed.

“That hussy. Who would date a forty-seven year old man at twenty? He could be her father. I’ll never forgive that little tramp.”

The icy despairing words of Isabelle’s mother echoed in her ears. The same bitter monologue day after day. The brunt of that anger directed at this young woman, Adrian Shore.

“hello.”

Isabelle didn’t answer immediately. She was very confused and had to consider the strangeness of her situation.

Diplomatically she replied, “What are you doing here?”

She wasn’t angry. She had witnessed what anger could transform a person into. She was confused and in nauseating pain. Nothing made sense.

Adrian hesitated. “I ran you over.”

Isabelle laughed.

This unsettled Adrian. She was not expecting that kind of response. The girl lying before her had to be about her age. She was gorgeous even with caked blood around her mouth. The girl looked disturbingly familiar. Something about her straight nose and the shape of her strong eyebrows. The almost black eyes, the delicate pointed shape of her lips, reminded Adrian of someone she had known sometime. She couldn’t place it. Why was she laughing about getting mauled by the front end of a car?

“I know you.”

Adrian waited for the girl to explain herself.

“You’re Adrian Shore.”

“Did we go to school together?” Adrian didn’t think this was the answer but it was the only thing she could think of.

“No. We’re mutual friends of a man named Michael Sands.”

Adrian was clearly dumbfounded. Was Michael cheating on her? Was this his previous girlfriend? Perhaps she was his former student…

“How do you know him?” She forced herself to sound casual.

“He’s my father.”

The silence in Room 513 was earsplitting.

Adrian dropped into a chair by the ugly still life. She was humiliated, awkward and uncomfortable. She ran over the daughter of her lover. A daughter that was probably the same age as her, a daughter who probably hated her on several different levels. She fidgeted and looked at her hands. They had an odd orange-ish tint from excessive self tanner.

“Thank you Adrian.”

Adrian began to cry. Tears that had formed in her heart hours earlier at the doctor’s office, tears that had been stifled for weeks bled from her ocean colored eyes.

“I wasn’t trying to upset you, I meant it. You saved me from something when you came in the room.”

Adrian looked up at the girl whose father she had stolen away through a curtain of brittle bleached hair. Tears leaked from her eyes and formed a puddle on her lap. Then she managed to reply with a small croak:

“What?”

Isabelle knew that she would sound crazy if she tried to explain the rotting cabbage breath on her cheek and the clicking toenails on the floor.

“There was some thing in the room. I couldn’t crane my neck to see it. It was standing here on my right side. It left when you came in.”

Adrian was clearly mystified, and Isabelle doubted that she had enough imagination to stomach the creature and all the impossibilities wrapped up with it. However, Isabelle was sure that she had witnessed it.

“It smelled of rotting cabbage. I’m honestly far more interested in that than whatever sordid circumstance we share.”

Adrian just stared at her. Guilt was threatening to choke her to death. Maybe Michael’s daughter had brain damage from the accident. Maybe she was in such pain that her neurons were firing amiss…

“Well, I’d better be going. I just wanted to make sure you were all right. Of course I’ll be the one paying for your hospital bills. Has your mother…”

Adrian’s speech gave out on the thought of Michael’s wife.

Isabelle couldn’t really guess at why she was sharing with the woman who was the object of her most recent suffering. This very lady had caused the breaking apart of her family, and the never-ending depression that hung over her house. Perhaps it was the heart palpitations she experienced at the thought of being alone with whatever that thing was. Possibly the painkillers had lowered her inhibitions. Whatever the reason for this newfound openness, it was destined to be short lived. An intensely private creature, Isabelle preferred her own company to just about anyone else’s. She didn’t even enjoy her own that much.

Ms. Shore inched carefully towards the door to room #513.

“Go if you’d like. I’ll be fine.”

Adrian blushed and nodded, then hustled out of the room.

Isabelle waited until the girl’s footsteps faded into nothing. She lifted her head and listened warily for the thing. It was feasible that she had conjured it up. Perhaps the physical stress had caused her to experience auditory hallucinations. Perhaps, but she didn’t think so. Something odd was in the stale air. That was one thing she was positive of.

Chapter 3: Rotting Cabbage

Kevin Dally promptly sent Isabelle home for the condition of her business casual apparel. She walked towards her car with a spring in her step. The air was brutally cold, and Isabelle who was already soaking, quickly began to freeze. Her hair was gathering icicles. The faithfully unreliable Geo Metro was waiting in the corner of the parking lot. Isabelle pulled open the door with some force to dislodge the ice that had formed. She flopped into the driver’s seat and put the key into the ignition. The engine sputtered and died. Isabelle dropped her head onto the steering wheel in frustration and the car’s horn went off. She jerked her head right back up and looked guiltily around the lot for some offended party. None appeared. After many failed attempts to get the vehicle to comply, Isabelle gave up and zipped her grey coat all the way to her neck. She slipped her red wooly scarf tight around her exposed throat and started the trek home on foot.

Any average human being would have gone back into their workplace, placed a few calls to devoted relatives or friends, told a sob story to their co-workers, or called a garage. Isabelle, however, was thoroughly sick of dealing with everyone in Grange City Bank, completely exhausted with her bitter angry mother, and had no real friends. So with a soft crunch of her feet on the snow she began a very long walk.

Four blocks later a fat snowflake landed on the tip of Isabelle’s nose. It was followed by never-ending comrades. The sky vomited up a giant ocean of frozen water. Isabelle was a tiny figure in a blinding white blur. She shivered, hunched her shoulders, and kept on.

Adrian sat in a coffee shop, diet forgotten, sipping a warm vat of espresso and caramel. She tried to fight the hysteria that was bubbling quietly to the surface. Twenty years old and her life was over. She tried to remind herself that phrases like those were melodramatic and not to be tolerated, but somehow it didn’t matter. Her carefully composed demeanor started to flake silently away. She felt as though she were sitting naked in a pile of her designer clothing. She could even imagine the bleach stripping from her naturally brown hair. She was undergoing a reverse metamorphosis. Adrian sat in the café a lonely little seventeen year old with a tragic haircut. Michael would be livid. He’d probably abandon her. The thought brought water to her bright blue eyes. She made up her mind as she finished the last sip of the caramel-coffee cocktail. It had to be done.

The weight of the decision made Adrian’s steps heavy and slow. She got in her little green car and started the engine. The car shuttered down Main Street, the wipers on full blast. It was still hard to discern much from the road ahead, but Adrian drove five over the limit despite this.

Too late to stop the green Mitsubishi as it thundered towards the wispy looking black-haired girl crossing the street.

Adrian heard the thud across the right side of her car and slammed on her brakes. Her heart beat out a drum solo, breaking ribs and dislocating lung tissue in abject terror. Her throat closed up and she could taste blood. She wanted to scream, to call the hospital, to die, but she just sat with her hands rigid on the steering wheel.

Isabelle crossed the street without so much of a glance in the other direction. She was miserable, teeth chattering, hands frozen, hair crunchy with ice, and toes that she felt she would surely lose to frostbite. She hated her house, she hated her job, and now her shitty car, the only method of escape left to her was sitting in a parking lot, and finally dead from the struggle. One moment she was lost in these black thoughts and the next she saw a bright yellow glow of headlights, and felt herself fly up into the air, seemingly forever and finally a pain that was so intense she couldn’t draw breath. Isabelle lay on her back in the road trying to breath, losing the world with each second. She was aware of cold, the snowdrops melting on her face. She watched the snow spiraling down and everything was white.

Adrian got out of the car after a moment or two, grabbed her cell phone and stepped into the blizzard with cold wind whipping into her medium length blonde hair. Red was leaking from the bedraggled creature in the snowy road. Its coal eyes were open. The skin matched the snow. The lips were pale and parted, mouth slightly open. Adrian stared down in numb disbelief. It was a girl.

Police and ambulance medics milled about the scene in a sort of frenzy. Nothing of this magnitude happened often around this town.

Isabelle woke up three hours later in a haze of white and wondered why it was taking so long for her to die. Surely hypothermia would have set in by now. The details began to emerge, like a hideous still life, the boxy television set hooked to a wall, and the sickening sterilized smell of death. She tried to move her head and the muscles clenched fiercely, screaming in resistance. Wincing, she dropped the inch of progress she had made in the endeavor. She relaxed her body and breathed deep. The pain was a living thing. It pressed on her ribs and smothered her face. It dug its fingers into her intestines and squeezed her brain tissue. A strange noise was coming from the corner of the room, just out of her range of vision. It sounded like toenails on tile. The thing skittered across the room rapidly. Without knowing why Isabelle’s heart jumped and began to beat frantically. Her hands clenched, and anxiety rapidly took control of her body. She was terrified of some silly unidentified sound. It was probably a rodent, or someone’s cat. Maybe it was even one of those ridiculous little purse sized dogs. The clicking drew closer to her bedside. She felt a slight breeze on her cheek. The window was firmly shut. The gust was tiny, and smelled slightly of vegetables and rotting fruit.

It was something’s breath.

Isabelle shut her eyes. She wanted to jump out of bed and run, but she knew her body would rebel instantly and she would crumple into a useless ball on the floor. She was trembling violently and breathing in short gasps. She could still feel and smell the thing’s breath. Her left hand inched up to the red nurse button.

Chapter 2: How far along are you?

Her phone started ringing again.

“Hello, this is Isabelle; can I make your day better?”

“Are you people having connection issues? I could take my money to another bank you know. Now I’d like to transfer the money please. This is Adrian Shore and my account is 5546663.”

Isabelle sucked in some stale air and typed in her computer.

“Done. Can I do anything else for you?”

“Yeah, fix your phone network.”

Adrian Shore hung up the phone and scoffed in disgust. She wedged her oversized feet into her furry beige snow boots and doused herself in perfume. Taking her frock coat off its hanger she strode out the door, click clacking all the way down the drive. Adrian got in the green Mitsubishi and started the engine, swearing under her breath with chattering teeth.

“So goddamn cold in this little shit-hole town… “

She was on her way to a doctor’s appointment concerning the troubling swelling of her stomach. Her size two pants weren’t fitting, and she hadn’t strayed from her diet of celery and lettuce. Something had to be done.

Isabelle spent an hour gazing intermittently at her computer screen and out the window. She consumed ten o’ clock with the construction of a rubber band ball. When lunchtime rolled around she was exhausted by lack of effort and walked briskly to the local grocery. Grange Grocery was devoid of customers. The solitary clerk, Ferris Hardy, was leaning up against his register eating a free sample. He nodded in Isabelle’s direction and wiped his greasy fingers on his apron.

One couldn’t say that Grange Grocery had much in the way of aesthetics. The harsh fluorescent light illuminated crowded aisles and sub par vegetables. Isabelle picked her way to the microwavable foods section. She felt around in her pockets for the crumpled up dollar bills she had deposited there earlier that morning. Ferris scanned the cup ’o ’noodle, palming her cash and making shallow conservation.

“39 cents, you’re a big spender.”

“Yeah.”

Maybe he was lonely. Maybe he was bored. Whatever the case, Isabelle was losing her patience as he prattled on about weather and local news. She gracefully departed with a grunted, “thanks” and a nod of her head.

The snow had started to fall again. It was beautiful and almost made up for the dismal condition of most of the real estate in Grange. Isabelle looked up at the heavy sky and caught flakes of snow on her long black eyelashes. She didn’t bother with her hood; the state of her tangled black hair could hardly worsen. She began walking in the direction of the bank, but the mere sight of it depressed her. Through the glowing windows Mr. Dally was easily recognized, stalking through the aisles of cubicles, doling out paperwork.

Temporarily an outsider to the scene, Isabelle wondered at how the average passerby would perceive it. They wouldn’t know anyone’s name or irritating habits, they would almost completely disregard the bank and its employees. She was a silhouette in a glowing window, a shadow on the wall. In the midst of these philosophical ponderings, a green Mitsubishi raced by and doused Isabelle’s shoddy business casual uniform in what used to be snow. She numbly stared down at the aftermath. Mr. Dally was going to have a mild seizure. The thought made her draw up the corners of her mouth in a wry smile.

***

Adrian Shore was a habitually late person. She never failed to apologize and proclaim her deepest regrets for her tardiness. She also never changed her practice of making everyone wait on her. The little green car rolled into the parking lot of Dr. L. Morat fifteen minutes after the appointment was due to begin.

“Congratulations Ms. Shore!”

Adrian stared at the middle-aged man in confusion. Her insides were squeezing together and she was sweating with her discomfort. He continued to smile in a knowing and friendly way.

“So are you hoping for a boy or a girl?”

Adrian wanted to assault the doctor for bringing this to light. She wanted to catapult out the door screaming. She wanted to slump onto the floor and cry passionately.

“Neither.” She replied in a brittle cold voice.

An awkward silence ensued leaving the doctor wringing his hands and casting about for something to say. Adrian collected her belongings quietly holding herself erect in the face of a thousand frenzied emotions, doubts, and thoughts.

“Well there are always options…” The man began in a practiced and careful monologue.

“Where do I pay?” Adrian cut him off in a terse voice. Her face was a white mask of self-control. She clenched her fingers together and tried her best not to vomit.

1. Good Morning Miss Sands

The sun’s insistent rays arced over the low hilltops, through a forest of quaking aspens and burst into the small grey bedroom of one Isabelle Sands. Isabelle rolled onto her belly and pressed her face further into the warm pillow. Outside the people began their morning rituals. A thousand automatons started their respective vehicles and buttered their morning toast. The mid-size city of Grange was beginning to rub the crust from its eyes and come alive. Busy citizens rushed off to jobs they loved, hated, or were (in most cases) tolerantly neutral to. Life was a well-oiled machine; they knew their particular functions.

Isabelle’s eyelids lazily drew apart and consciousness replaced her nonsensical dreams. The fantastic myriad of colors became the grey bedroom and the pockmarked ceiling.

Some cast iron pan was cooking bacon downstairs. Isabelle, drawn by the smell, abandoned her warm bed and soft blankets. The television was on as always, an ever-present member of the household spitting out black prophecies and shampoo commercials. Her mother was hunched over the sink, scrubbing a persistent remnant of last night’s lasagna.

“Morning.”

“You’re late.” Her mother didn’t look up with the accusation, just kept on with the dish.

Isabelle snatched a piece of bacon from the pan, it was still warm and she wiped the grease from it on her pant leg.

“This tastes like heart disease.” Isabelle remarked to the kitchen air.

“Why don’t you get dressed? God knows why those people put up with you; can’t you get to work on time once? You’re going to get fired, and then what you ungrateful little shit?”

The words came hissing out in a tired way. They were overused, the poison gone. Mrs. Sands scrubbed the pot as she spoke them, too lethargic to meet eyes with her target.

Seven minutes later the front door shut.

Isabelle sat in her defrosting Geo metro and shivered.

The sky was bleak, the trees dead and naked. The snow from last Tuesday had evolved into a filthy frozen slush. The left back window didn’t come flush with the frame of the car, so the left side of the backseat smelled of molding fabric. Isabelle put the car in drive and it sputtered down the narrow road. She pulled into her spot in the pot-holed parking lot in front of Grange City Bank.

A man wearing a furry orange cap waved as he strode out of the bank, holding the door open for her. This was an oddity; Isabelle knew most of the regular customers. Not many in Grange would leave the house in something so garish and bright. It was a city of grey, black, brown, and tan. Maybe a few daring housewives would venture out in white or taupe. The man in the painfully brilliant orange hat seized Isabelle’s attention. It was quickly yanked in another direction as her manager, Kevin Dally, cleared his throat in her direction.

“Hello Ms. Sands.”

She swallowed and tried her best to erect a veneer of regret on her face.

“I know you live a little bit out of town, but that’s no excuse for this constant tardiness. We are trying to run a company here. Are you going to put in your one hundred and twenty-five percent Ms. Sands?”

Mr. Dally straightened his nametag and looked down at her business casual attire disapprovingly.

Isabelle looked at the seventies brown carpet and tried to think about what must live in there.

“Your appearance is simply unacceptable. When is the last time you ironed your shirt? This is a professional job. I’d like to just remind you of that.”

She nodded humbly and began a slow shuffle towards her cubicle, eyes fixed on the carpet.

Mr. Dally let out a little noise of exasperation and relented. Sighing in relief, Isabelle turned on her computer and sunk into her chair. The phone would start its never ceasing wail in about fifteen minutes and she inwardly prepared herself for the onslaught of unsatisfied customers. The bank had low ceilings and jail-cell windows. Its walls were painted cream.

A large woman named Fern Simmons had the cubicle closest to Isabelle. She had a French manicure every other Tuesday and her talons were a constant source of great pride. Glamour shots of her twin Pomeranians decorated the cubicle wall. She was in love with the UPS deliveryman. She organized mandatory themed office days with Mr. Dally. The last was a Hawaiian luau, which required all employees to answer the phone with, “Aloha friend.” She leaned over the separator and peered in at Isabelle.

“Late again?”

Isabelle, who was staring blankly at the wall, blinked and looked up.

“Don’t worry honey; I’ll talk to Kevin for you.”

Isabelle drew up the corners of her mouth in what she hoped looked like a grateful smile.

“You sure are quiet, you know that? It’s refreshing to meet a young person who is a good listener. What with all these new cell phones you never seem to run into a person whose lips aren’t flapping.”

Fern licked her thin lips and bared her teeth in a broad smile.

Spittle had landed on the coversheet of Isabelle’s “Employee Feedback Survey.”

Ms. Simmons retreated to her hole and began tapping enthusiastically on her keyboard.

The phone rang.
Once, twice, three times….

“Hello, this is Isabelle; can I make your day better?”

“Can I make your day better” was a Monday catchphrase. Tuesday was “I’m here to serve!”

“Yes, I’d like to transfer three hundred dollars to my checking account. My name is Adrian Shore.”

The name zipped through Isabelle’s synapses. Without hesitation she dropped the phone into its cradle.

Adrian Shore.

***

Starring, Isabelle Sands

Here is Isabelle Sands, the main character in the story that will occupy this blog. Feel free to comment with helpful criticism and potential titles for the book.
(Mediocre is just a working title.)
Thank you