By-Product
Part 3
To her left were bins of greenery bushes, and to her right was a small, narrow forest of artificial trees. She was considering making her own floral arrangement for her dinner table when there was a rustle behind her, and the unmistakable sense of someone watching her. Eileen gasped and spun around, gaze locking immediately on the sea-green eyes staring back at her.
"Hello, Clarice."
"Henry!" she cried out, reaching through the tangle of trees to thwap him with a bush of ivy. "You sonuva... Where were you off to?"
"The art supplies," Henry replied spookily with a soft, even tone, not breaking character.
She ignored his game. "Get anything?"
"No," he replied, reaching for her through the plastic branches and waggling his fingers. "It's all toooo expeeennsiiiivve…"
"What is wrong with you?"
He finally cracked a smile. "Physically, mentally, or emotionally?" His voice was normal.
He was being goofy as an apology for earlier. He didn't want her to be angry with him for getting short with her, even if she knew that he hated it when she joked when he was trying to be serious. And that was one of the things about him that drove her nuts, and not in the good way. Another reason that she, in the end, wanted to just be friends. But despite all this passing through her mind, Eileen only shook her head at him. "Just get yer butt over here."
Instead of walking down his aisle and around the trees, Henry crept through them instead. "Jungle in here," he commented, ducking under the leaves. He made it through and fingered the silk foliage. "Who buys a fake tree?"
"I dunno," Eileen said, stuffing the bush back into its bin.
"I don't even think real trees can survive in little baskets."
"That's why it has to be fake."
"Who's going to walk into someone's house and believe that this tree is real?"
"No one would believe it was real!"
"Then what's the point?"
Eileen shook her head at him again. "It's just to give a house some decoration or color."
"You're not gonna buy one of these, are you?"
She grinned at him. "You know, I just might."
"Traitor."
She laughed. "I'm done here," she said, gesturing to the picture frame in her basket. "Let's check out."
He nodded, and followed her to the front of the store. There was only one register open, and a small group of three women were already at the counter, so Henry and Eileen took their place in line behind them. They waited, browsing through the candy, magazines, and other impulse merchandise planted at the front of the store.
Eileen wouldn't have taken any special notice of the one woman if she hadn't noticed that Henry was staring at her. She had nudged him to point out the dollar bath soaps and ask if he also thought they would probably give someone a rash, but he didn't seem to be paying attention. She nudged him again, looking at him pointedly, but his focus remained straight ahead. Finally, her own gaze went to the woman.
Nothing special. She was old, past middle age, but not really elderly. Eileen would have placed her around fifty. Her grey hair was short and pulled up, and she wore a simple carnation-colored dress. She was accompanied by two other women about her age, one wearing what Eileen considered to be an atrocious purple hat, and the other carrying one of those large tote bags that looked like it was a wicker basket that had been smashed flat with a hammer. The three gabbed on about something or other. Eileen hadn't been listening to them long enough to discern exactly what, but it was apparently quite funny, as even the cashier's straight-lined mouth quirked up into a smile and the three women chortled--
"How can you just stand there and laugh?" Henry suddenly said.
The ladies were quiet and stared at him in surprise. Eileen did likewise. He sounded so angry. In fact, as she looked at him now, she finally noticed that his breathing, though steady, seemed deeper, heavier. His eyebrows were drawn together as he glared at the one woman, the one in the modest rose dress.
The one with the clashing hat finally spoke up. "I-I'm sorry, are you talking to--"
"Shut-up," Henry spat.
What the hell! Eileen grabbed Henry and shook him. "Henry! What's wrong with you?" She glanced over at the women, who gaped at him.
Henry brought a hand up to his face, pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. He winced; an obvious headache. But he kept talking. "Jesus fucking Christ! After what you did, how can you just laugh!"
"Ex… excuse me…" the cashier tried to say. Eileen saw the girl's fingers resting on the phone by her register.
"He killed eighteen people!" Henry spat, glowering at the woman as if her was going to vomit. "You left him there and they got their hands on him and raised him and molded him into a murdering psychopath! Do you realize what you've done? What could have happened? All because you were young and stupid and listened to that bastard and just left your responsibility in some measly blanket on the floor to die! And here you are, years later, thinking that it doesn't matter anymore because you no longer have anything to do with him, because you have a new life! Well, guess what, Mommy: nineteen people are dead because you got knocked up and couldn't handle it!"
Very silent. And then Henry came back to himself, and the disgusted glare changed into a look of shocked horror as he raised his hand to his mouth. The woman stared back at him. Her face was drained of color and her hands were tightly wrung together.
Finally, Eileen just dropped her shopping basket-- the glass in the frame no doubt cracking-- and took hold of his arm, dragging him from the store. It briefly crossed her mind to throw back some sort of apology, but she quickly decided that nothing she could say in one moment would set the stunned women or the bewildered cashier at ease. She just pulled him out to the car and unlocked the door with the button on her keychain. "Get in."
Henry just stood there, with one hand over his eyes and the other hand planted on the roof of her sedan.
"Henry."
His shoulders got tenser and his fingers curved on top of the car.
Eileen pulled him away from the car and opened the door herself. She coaxed him into the seat. She closed the door, then glanced back at the store. She could see the women still inside; the one Henry had singled out just watched her while the other two talked rapidly to each other.
She moved around the car and got into the driver's seat.
